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COFYRiGKT DEPOSIT 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

A HANDBOOK 
OF CHRISTIAN TEACHING 



BY 
W. C. CLARK, D.D. 

'Help me to tell what I believe." 




BOSTON 

SHERMAN, FRENCH & COMPANY 

1915 






copyright, 1914 
Sherman, French & Company 



/f° 



JAN -2 1315 

©CI.A393049 
■too / 



s- 



TO 

THE PEOPLE WHOM I HAVE SERVED 

IN THE PASTORATES OF 

PASS CHRISTIAN, MISSISSIPPI 

GREENSBORO AND NEWBERNE. ALABAMA 

SHELBYVILLE, TENNESSEE 

AUGUSTA AND SHARON, KENTUCKY 

LIVINGSTON AND BOLIGEE, ALABAMA 

WOODLAWN, ALABAMA 

AND TO 

MY DEVOTED WIFE 

WHO HAS SHARED WITH ME 
THE SACRIFICES AND THE 
REWARDS OF THIS SERVICE 



INTRODUCTION 

It is a pleasure and a compliment to introduce 
this book to the public. 

The themes are the most momentous over which 
a human being ever held awful and anxious debate 
with himself. 

The author, by nature, by culture, by experi- 
ence, by sympathy, is splendidly competent to 
handle them, and has handled them in a competent 
and satisfying way. 

His aim is popular theology, an answer to the 
appeal of the earnest Christian, " Help me to tell 
what I believe." He does it ; he does it thor- 
oughly. He sweeps the whole gamut of the Chris- 
tian faith — in language that is simple, in terms 
that are everyday. 

It starts no questions, it airs no doubts, it pa- 
rades no speculations ; it takes the reader into the 
sanctuary of Holy Scripture, and holds his ear 
to the mouth of God as he speaks in his Word. 

It has been a long time since anything so sound 
and loyal has come from the press. As old as the 
Gospel, these views are about to have the interest 
— and preciousness — of antiques. 

When David was besieged in the cave of Adul- 



INTRODUCTION 

lam, and his native Bethlehem was in the hands 
of the Philistines, he cried out, " that one would 
give me drink of the water of the well of Bethle- 
hem, which is by the gate ! " Three of his mighty 
men brought him water from the well of his father, 
from the well of his childhood, — but he poured 
it out as a libation unto the Lord. 

Beset by Philistine critics and speculators and 
reconstructionists, here is drink from the well of 
our fathers — the faith of our childhood — so 
cool, so refreshing, so delicious, so biblical! 

R. A. Webb. 

Presbyterian Theological Seminary of Kentucky, 
Louisville, Kentucky. 



PREFACE 

" Help me to tell what I believe" was the ear- 
nest appeal of an intelligent young Christian to 
a pastor. It is believed that there are many oth- 
ers of this class, who would like to read a clear- 
cut statement of the Christian faith. 

There are not a few thoughtful men who would 
really like to know what Christians of the evan- 
gelical branches of the Church hold and teach. 

There are others who are prejudiced against 
Christianity because they have been misinformed 
as to its teachings. These misconceptions might 
be removed by the reading of such a volume. 

There are " seekers after the truth " in foreign 
lands, who would welcome a clear statement of the 
truth held and taught by those who would lead 
them to embrace Christianity. 

There are Christian teachers and workers who 
need a brief outline of the evidences and doctrines 
of Christianity for use in instructing others in 
the knowledge of the truth. 

There are many excellent works on Theology, 
but they are too large, too expensive and too tech- 
nical. There is a felt need for a work that covers 
the ground and yet is of moderate size and cost, 



PREFACE 

and written in a style easily understood by those 
not familiar with the terms used in the more 
learned treatises on such subjects. The attempt 
has been made to prepare such a volume in the 
hope that it may be used by the Great Head of 
the Church, both at home and abroad, for the 
glory of His name, for the salvation of souls and 
for the comfort and confirmation of the children 
of God in their faith. It is a book by a pastor 
for the people. 

Material has been prepared for a companion 
volume on " The Church : Its Government, Wor- 
ship, Sacraments and Work," which may be issued 
later should this prove acceptable to the reading 
public. 

W. C. Clark. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I Our Hope 1 

II The Bible from God . . . . 11 
III The Books We Have are the Bible, 

and They Only are the Bible . 28 
IV The Bible the Rule of Faith and 

Practice 46 

V God, His Existence and Attributes 57 

VI Creation 72 

VII Angels 83 

VIII Providence 94 

IX Sin 106 

X The Law ........ 118 

XI God's Plan of Rescue . . . .130 

XII The Person of Christ — His Hu- 
manity and Divinity . . . .138 

XIII The Atonement 149 

XIV Salvation Applied 163 

XV The Change of Heart . . . .172 

XVI Evidences of a Change of Heart 184 

XVII Repentance 193 

XVIII Faith 203 

XIX What is a Christian? . . . .215 



CHAPTER PAGE 

XX The Method of Justification . . 225 

XXI Membership in the Family of God 234 

XXII Sanctification 245 

XXIII Good Works 258 

XXIV Assurance 268 

XXV Perseverance 277 

XXVI Death 286 

XXVII The Resurrection 299 

XXVIII The General Judgment . . . 309 

XXIX Heaven 322 

XXX Hell 332 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 



CHAPTER I 
OUR HOPE 

The age in which we live is one in which the 
most sacred beliefs are called in question. It is 
an age, too, in which there are many earnest 
searchers after the truth. It is important, there- 
fore, on the one hand, to be able to answer the 
objections of such as seek to overthrow our faith, 
and, on the other hand, to be prepared to guide 
and instruct such as are really seeking the truth. 
We must be " ready always to give an answer to 
every man that asketh a reason for the hope that 
is in us." 

It will prove of great service to the believer to 
keep constantly in mind that Christianity is based 
upon facts that are capable of being made evident 
to the mind open to the reception of the truth. 
The existence of God, the birth of Christ, His 
death and resurrection, are specimens of the great 
facts upon which our holy religion rests. The 
evidences of these facts are sufficient to satisfy 
every reasonable demand. The work of grace in 
the heart is no less a fact than the provision of 
salvation through the death and resurrection of 
Christ, hence every Christian should be able, not 
only to give an outline of the evidences of Chris- 



2 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

tianity, but also the evidences of his own conver- 
sion ; not only to show that Christianity is from 
God, but. that he has accepted Christ as his only 
hope of salvation. 

It is also a fact that God has made a revelation 
of His will to sinners, teaching them " what 
they are to believe concerning Him and what 
duty He requires of them." This revelation 
is clear, full and sufficient. Nothing needs to be 
added to it and nothing should be subtracted from 
it. The Christian should know and be able to 
state the evidences upon which this revelation is 
received as from God. He should be acquainted 
with the contents of this revelation, for here are 
to be found all of the doctrines he is to believe, the 
worship he should practice and the form of gov- 
ernment under which he should live in the Church, 
He should seek this knowledge and be ready to 
give a reason for the faith and hope in his own 
mind and heart. He should be able to state all 
of the essential teachings of Christianity and to 
give to friend and foe the grounds upon which 
he accepts Christianity and its teachings. He 
should be glad to tell others of the blessed hope 
set before him in the gospel and received into his 
own soul. It is true that one may be a Christian 
without being able to give a clear and connected 
statement of the Christian faith. He may be a 
child of God without being able to make plain to 
others how and when he became such. He may be 
like the little Scotch girl who, when being exam- 



OUR HOPE 3 

ined by her pastor for admission to the Lord's 
table, could not state her views quite clearly — so 
that the elders were about to delay her admission 
till better instructed. But as she was turning to 
go from their presence she said, with tears in her 
eyes, " I canna' talk much for Jesus, but I love 
Him well enough to die for Him," and so gained a 
place at His table. There may be many others 
among the followers of Christ who are not able to 
make a clear and satisfactory statement of their 
faith. Still it is the duty and privilege of every 
Christian to be able to give some reason for the 
hope that is in him. While it may not be essen- 
tial to his salvation to be able to give a clear out- 
line of all of these subjects, it is essential to his 
comfort, protection and usefulness in the Chris- 
tian life. For your own satisfaction you should 
possess this knowledge and be able to communicate 
it to others. You ought to be able to tell others 
" how this hope arose, what it contains and on 
what it is based." As a matter of intelligence a 
man should know why he is a Christian; why he 
believes the Bible to be a revelation from God and 
why he believes he has accepted Christ as his 
Savior; why he believes in a certain system of 
doctrine, of government and worship. What 
would be thought of a citizen who could give no 
intelligent account of the teaching of the consti- 
tution of his country nor of the reasons why he 
loved his country? What would be thought of 
a member of a political party who could not give 



4 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

an outline of his party's platform nor the reasons 
why he preferred the principles of that party to 
those held by the opposite party? What should 
be thought of the Christian who can give no ac- 
count of the constitution of the great Christian 
commonwealth of which he is a member nor of the 
reasons for his devotion to the spiritual govern- 
ment to which he claims allegiance ? What should 
be thought of the member of a particular church 
who cannot tell a stranger what doctrines it holds, 
what form of government it exercises and what 
form of worship it observes? You would un- 
doubtedly expect the citizen to know something of 
the constitution of his country, the politician to 
be informed as to the principles of his party, and 
the Christian as to the teachings of Christ and 
the member of a given branch of the Church to 
know what interpretation his church puts upon 
the leading teachings of God's Word. As a mat- 
ter of information, then, every Christian should 
post himself on such important subjects. He 
should be able to give an outline of the evidences 
of Christianity, an outline of the plan of salva- 
tion, the evidences of a change of heart, and to 
state clearly the doctrines, the government and the 
worship of the church of which he is a member. 

As a means of comfort and strength one needs 
to be well established in the faith. The apostle 
James compares the double minded man to " a 
wave of the sea driven of the wind and tossed," 
and declares him to be " unstable in all of his 



OUR HOPE 5 

ways." Such a man can neither be strong nor 
comfortable in his religious life any more than 
the vacillating man in any other department of 
life. How can he have peace and comfort con- 
cerning his hope unless he have confidence that it 
rests upon the Rock of Ages? How can he be 
strong to resist the influence of error unless he be 
well grounded in the faith? How can he be strong 
to ward off the assaults of Satan unless he know 
how to wield the sword of the Spirit? How can 
he be strong to do the work of the Christian un- 
less he be strong in the Lord and in the power 
of His might? As you would have comfort and 
strength in your Christian life, study the Word of 
God that you may " grow in grace and in the 
knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ." 

Still further, you should be able to give a reason 
for the hope that is in you to correct the many 
misrepresentations that are made concerning the 
Bible, concerning Christianity and concerning 
that form of Christianity which you hold to be 
that which is taught in the Word of God. As in 
the days of the Apostles, so now, this way is 
" everywhere spoken against." The Bible is mis- 
represented as teaching doctrines to which God 
hath never given His approval. An intelligent 
lawyer once raised the objection to the Bible that 
it taught that God would punish all men equally. 
When asked to cite the passage he could not, of 
course, do so, for it is written " God shall render 
unto every man according to his deeds." 



6 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Christianity is misrepresented as lending en- 
couragement to sin by teaching that no man who 
trusts in Christ shall ever be condemned, whereas 
Paul, who so clearly set forth the doctrine of 
justification by faith, rejects this conclusion with 
abhorrence and shows that the love of Christ, the 
strongest motive, constraineth the believer not to 
live unto himself but unto Christ who died for him. 

Each denomination of Christians has been mis- 
represented. There are many persons who will 
not take the trouble to examine the " standards of 
faith " of other churches, but form their opinions 
from some partial or prejudiced statement as to 
what such churches hold, and then repeat these 
statements as true. For example, the Baptist 
church has been accused of teaching that " bap- 
tism saves " ; the Methodist church of being " like 
the Catholic " ; the Presbyterian church of deny- 
ing the " free agency of man " ; and the Episcopal 
church of holding to " baptismal regeneration." 
Even so great and good a man as John Wesley is 
reported to have said in one of his sermons that 
" Calvinism was worthy of the Devil for its au- 
thor." To this Dr. Dabney replied, " If Calvin- 
ism were what Wesley represented it to be, it 
would be worthy of the Devil for its author; but 
being what it is, it is the very embodiment of God's 
truth drawn from His own Word." A distin- 
guished judge once said to a minister, 

" I like your church, but I do not see how it can 
hold that horrible doctrine of ' total depravity.' " 



OUR HOPE 7 

" What do you understand by total depravity, 
Judge?" 

" Why, that every man is as bad as he can be." 

" Neither do I believe that," said the minister ; 
" but that is not what we mean by total depravity. 
We mean that every man is ' wholly defiled, in 
all the faculties and parts of soul and body,' that 
his mind is darkened by sin, his heart hardened, 
his will perverted and the image of God lost — 
that ' the heart of man is deceitful above all things 
and desperately wicked ' — that men are 4 dead in 
trespasses and sins.' The love of God no longer 
dwells in the heart of man, but enmity is there. 
In all of his soul he has gone away from God and 
fallen into such a state of sin that nothing but 
the power of God can restore to his soul the lost 
likeness of God." 

" I believe that," said the judge. 

" Then we are at one on that point," replied the 
minister. 

To whatever Christian church you belong, you 
should give such study and attention to the Word 
of God, to the teachings of Christianity and to the 
interpretation of the system given by your own 
church, that you may be able to correct such mis- 
representations. You should have clear and dis- 
tinct views of the truth yourself, that you may be 
able to discover and correct any errors and mis- 
representations made by others. Unless you have 
such knowledge, you are not only at the mercy of 
those by whom your faith is assailed, but you are 



8 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

not able to make a proper defense of the Bible, 
nor of Christianity, nor of your own faith, as re- 
ceived from those who have handed it down to you. 

For the benefit of others you should know the 
grounds on which the Christian faith is received, 
the evidences on which you depend for your inter- 
est in that hope, and the doctrines, the government 
and worship taught in the Bible. 

Since Christ's ascension it is largely through 
His people that He reveals to men the way of life. 
It is true that this book is the only infallible rule 
of faith and practice and that herein the way of 
life is clearly revealed. But men are slow to study 
and slower to receive the teaching of this Word. 
Hence God hath ordained that His truth shall be 
brought into contact with other minds and hearts 
through the word and testimony of those who have 
already felt its power and known its preciousness. 
" Ye are my witnesses." " Ye are living epistles 
known and read of all men." " Ye are the light 
of the world." That is, you may be the means of 
instructing, guiding and enlightening others by 
your word and example. If you know the plan 
of salvation you can tell others. If you know the 
teaching of Christ you can instruct others. If 
you can give a reason for the hope that is in you, 
you may be the means of leading others to in- 
dulge such a hope. If you neglect to secure such 
knowledge 3^ou may become guilty of your broth- 
er's blood. A young man was fatally injured in 
a great manufacturing plant. He knew he must 



OUR HOPE 9 

soon pass into eternity and called upon his com- 
panions to tell him the way of life and pray for 
him. Not one felt competent to instruct him. 
He went to the bar of God untaught by some who 
claimed to be the children of God. You ought to 
learn to tell men how to be saved. " If any of you 
do err from the truth, and one convert him, let him 
know that he which converteth a sinner from the 
error of his way shall save a soul from death and 
shall hide a multitude of sins." 

As a means of promoting Christian unity you 
should study the teaching of God's Word as to 
what doctrines should be held. Heretofore the 
people of God have spent much time in discussing 
the points upon which they differ. It is time they 
were considering the truths upon which they agree. 
You would be surprised to find upon how many 
doctrines we are at one. We all take the Word of 
God to be the source of our belief. We all be- 
lieve in the Trinity. We all believe in the divinity 
of Christ. We all receive the personality and di- 
vinity of the Holy Spirit. We all .repeat the 
Apostles' Creed together. We all admit the fall 
of man and believe in the redemption purchased by 
Christ. We all claim the same Father, trust the 
same Savior and hope to be made holy through the 
same Holy Spirit. We belong to the same army, 
follow the same Captain, contend against the same 
enemies, love the same cause and seek the same 
heaven. The more you study the Bible and the 
better you know and love Christ, the more will you 



10 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

discover and rejoice in the unity of the Church 
of God which gathers into its fold all who love 
and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation. 
Then for the glory of God and for the honor of 
religion you should be ready to defend His truth, 
testify to His grace and teach the doctrines, wor- 
ship and government of His Church. The teach- 
ing of His Word, the testifying to the power of 
His grace and the shining of His grace in your 
hearts and lives will be the means of declaring His 
glory and of extending His kingdom. 



CHAPTER II 
THE BIBLE FROM GOD 

The Bible is the source from which the Christian 
derives the light that guides his feet, the water 
that refreshes his spirit, and the food that nour- 
ishes his soul on his pilgrimage from earth to 
heaven. It is the chart by which alone he can 
guide his frail bark over the rough sea of life and 
anchor safely in the haven of heaven. Without 
such a chart he must inevitably make shipwreck 
on the rocks and reefs along the shore of time. 
With the Bible and with the Savior whom it re- 
veals he has life and salvation. Without these he 
is without God and without hope in the world. 
No wonder, therefore, that the Christian clings to 
the Bible with all of the tenacity with which the 
shipwrecked mariner clings to his life boat. 

For his own information, for the instruction of 
others, for the best interests of the Church and for 
the glory of God, every man ought to know and 
be able to state the reasons upon which he accepts 
this book as a revelation from God. 

It is with the hope of helping you in your efforts 

to secure such knowledge that a brief outline of 

these evidences is now given. Having shown you 

11 



12 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the importance of being able " to give an answer 
to him that asketh you a reason of the hope that 
is in you," some of the grounds upon which the 
Bible is believed to be the inspired revelation of 
the divine will are now furnished. 

The fact that many of the greatest and best 
men in many lands and for long ages have accepted 
this book as from God, through men who spake as 
they were moved by the Holy Ghost, may be taken 
as a presumptive evidence of its divine origin. It 
was received as inspired, read publicly in the 
churches in the age immediately succeeding its de- 
livery and has been so received from that day to 
this. There must have been something about the 
book and the evidences in its favor which im- 
pressed their minds and hearts with its supernat- 
ural character. The fact that the Church uni- 
versal, in all of its branches and divisions, accepts 
this book as a divine revelation shows that it is 
regarded as entitled to a place in the hearts of men 
given to no merely human production. This fact 
at least shows that according to the verdict of the 
Church universal this is God's Word, the only 
infallible rule of faith and practice. 

Among the more positive grounds of belief that 
this is the Word of God is the fact that miracles 
have been wrought in attestation of the claims to 
inspiration on the part of those who wrote it. A 
miracle is an act wrought by the power of God, in 
the presence of witnesses, to establish the claims 
of those who profess to reveal His will. It is 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 13 

something beyond the power of man or angels to 
do. It is something which can be wrought only by 
the power of God, and which, when wrought in 
order to attest the claims of one speaking for God, 
puts it beyond all reasonable doubt that such per- 
sons are what they claim — teachers sent from 
God. For example, when Moses was sent to lead 
the children of Israel out of the land of bondage, 
he expressed a fear that the people would not be- 
lieve that God had sent him. It was then that 
God gave him permission to use His name and to 
work miracles that the people might be led to be- 
lieve that he was sent of God and that he spake in 
His name and wrought by His power. You re- 
member how his rod was turned into a snake, his 
hand made leprous and the water which he took 
from the river and poured upon the dry land was 
turned into blood according to the promise of 
God. " If they will not believe also these two 
signs, neither hearken to thine voice, that thou 
shalt take the water of the river and pour it upon 
the dry land, and the water which thou takest out 
of the river, shall become blood upon the dry 
land." When Moses pled that he was not elo- 
quent, but that he was slow of speech, God bade 
him go and promised to " be with his mouth 
and teach him what he should say." God was 
to guide him in what he should say and then 
confirm his claim to be speaking for God by the 
miracles which should be wrought,. Then you 
are familiar with that wonderful series of mira- 



14 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

cles by which Pharaoh and his people and the 
children of Israel were at last all convinced that 
God was speaking through Moses. You recall 
the ten plagues culminating in the death of the 
first born in every home where the blood was not 
found upon the lintel and the door post. You 
remember the passage through the Red Sea on 
dry ground, the manna from heaven, the water 
from the flinty rock that followed them in the 
way. 

These miracles must have been wrought or 
the children of Israel would never have left the 
land of bondage. Their enemies would not 
have permitted it and they would not have un- 
dertaken it. Dr. Scott has well said, 

" The narratives of these miracles may be 
clearly shown to have been published very soon 
after the time and at the places at which they 
are said to have been wrought in the most con- 
spicuous manner and before a very great multi- 
tude of enemies as well as friends. They con- 
stituted a public challenge to every man to con- 
tradict or disprove them, if he could, yet this 
public challenge never called forth a single in- 
dividual to deny that they were really per- 
formed. Surely Moses could never have per- 
suaded the whole nation that they had witnessed 
the plagues of Egypt, that their first born had 
been spared, their enemies destroyed, that they 
had passed through the sea dry shod and had 
been fed forty years in the wilderness had none 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 15 

of these events ever taken place. And if that 
generation could not have been thus imposed 
upon, then surely the next generation could not 
have been persuaded that their fathers had seen 
and experienced such wonderful things, when they 
had never before heard a word about them." 

The truth is it requires greater credulity to 
believe that the exodus could have been effected 
without these miracles than with them. The 
Passover is still observed among the Jews and is 
a living monument to the belief of that people that 
God did spare their first born on the night on 
which the destroying angel slew the first born in 
every family that had not, by faith, sprinkled the 
blood upon the lintel and the door post. 

The miracles of the New Testament are no less 
striking nor any less authentic. The healing of 
the leper, the restoration of sight to the man born 
blind, the raising of Lazarus and the resurrection 
of Jesus Christ are all vouched for by witnesses 
whose testimony would be received in any of the 
courts of our land. So strong is the testimony 
in favor of the resurrection of Christ that Ran- 
dolph Tucker, a distinguished teacher of law at 
Washington and Lee University, said that he had 
never won a lawsuit with one tenth of the evidence 
that was to be found in favor of the resurrection of 
Christ. It has been well asked, " When could the 
belief in the resurrection of Christ and in the 
miracles wrought by Him and His apostles have 
been obtruded on mankind if they had never hap- 



16 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

pened? " Surely not in the age in which they were 
witnessed by hundreds and thousands who were 
publicly challenged to deny them. If not then, 
when could they have been begun to be believed? 
It is far easier to admit the miracles as the origin 
and explanation of Christianity than to account 
for it in any other way. The sacrament of the 
Lord's Supper and the observance of the first day 
of the week are two living monumental evidences 
pointing back to the death and resurrection of 
Christ. If such events had never taken place men 
could never have been persuaded to keep these or- 
dinances in commemoration of them any more than 
the Jews could have been led to keep the Passover 
in memory of God's mercy in sparing their first 
born had He never shown them that kindness ; or 
than that we as a people could have been induced 
to celebrate the birthday of George Washington 
had no such man ever been born. Deny the mira- 
cles of the Bible and you must refuse to believe in 
human testimony and cease to accept the plainest 
statements of histor}'. If, then, those who spoke 
and wrote the words of this book claimed to be in- 
spired and God wrought miracles by them in at- 
testation of their claims, then they must have been 
from God and must have spoken the words He put 
into their mouths and penned the thoughts He 
breathed into their minds. We know they were 
teachers sent of God for no man could do the mira- 
cles which they did except God were with him. 
Another strong proof of the inspiration of the 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 17 

Bible may be drawn from the prophecies it con- 
tains. 

A prophet is, literally, one who speaks for God. 
But since God knows the future as well as the 
past and since His kingdom has always had to 
do with the future quite as much as with the past, 
we find in the words of those who have spoken 
for God many predictions of events which no hu- 
man sagacity could have foreseen. Only God can 
know the future. Hence if there be found in this 
revelation predictions concerning future events, 
made hundreds of years prior to the events, which 
afterward came to pass in exact accordance with 
the prediction, then we may fairly conclude that 
it was God who foresaw and foretold such events 
through the instrumentality of men whom He had 
inspired to reveal His will. If we can find one 
such prophecy made and fulfilled we can conclude 
that God revealed Himself through such prophet, 
and if through one then through all of' those who 
foretold such events. The number and variety of 
such prophecies is so great that it will be impos- 
sible to present them all. You will find them dis- 
cussed in such books as Newton and Keith on 
" Prophecy " and Alexander on the " Evidences of 
Christianity," to which we are largely indebted for 
the facts which are now to be presented. 

Recall the prophecies concerning the Jewish 
people. God threatened to bring against them " a 
nation from afar, as swift as the eagle flyeth, a 
nation whose tongue they should not understand." 



18 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

This was fulfilled when the Chaldeans and after- 
wards when the Romans came against them. The 
Romans were from afar, the rapidity of their con- 
quests resembled the eagle's flight in pursuit of 
its prey, the standard of their army was an eagle 
and their language was unknown to the Jews. 
Their cities were to be taken and their walls to 
be thrown down. This was fulfilled when Nebu- 
chadnezzar took Jerusalem, burned the temple and 
took down the walls of the city. (II Kings 
25:10.) Famine was to accompany and follow 
such invasions. This was fulfilled in more in- 
stances than one. It was fulfilled in the siege of 
Samaria by the king of Syria when two women 
agreed to give up their children to be eaten. 
(II Kings 6:28, 29.) It was fulfilled when the 
Chaldeans came against Jerusalem and it was ful- 
filled when the Romans besieged the same city, on 
which occasion Josephus informs us that a noble 
woman killed and ate a part of her own child and 
hid the remainder for future meals. 

Great numbers of the Jews were to be slain and 
the remnant scattered among all nations. It is 
estimated that in the siege of Jerusalem by Titus 
110,000 persons perished by fire and famine and 
sword. We know that the ten tribes were car- 
ried away from their own land by the king of 
Assyria, that the two tribes were afterwards taken 
to Babylon and that subsequently the Romans 
took away their place and nation and that from 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 19 

that day to this they have been scattered among 
all nations and in almost all lands. 

They were, nevertheless, to be kept separate 
and distinct from all people and so it has come to 
pass. Everywhere you go you find Jews and 
everywhere you find them they are separate and 
distinct, notwithstanding all of the persecution to 
which they have been exposed and by which they 
have been sorely tempted to merge their identity 
by intermarrying with people of other races. If 
you could pour a pitcher of clear spring water 
into one of our interior water courses and follow 
its course down the river to the Gulf and across 
the Atlantic, and see that while it moved among 
all waters it mingled with none but preserved its 
identity, it would not be so wonderful as the fact 
that the Jewish people, dispersed from Judea, have 
been scattered among all nations and yet have 
mingled with none, but have been kept separate 
and distinct so that you can still recognize them 
as members of the race of God's chosen people. 
No wonder, when it was asked that a short argu- 
ment for inspiration be given the answer came 
back, " The Jew." He is a living fulfillment of 
prophecy and a most striking evidence that " holy 
men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost." 

There are some striking predictions concerning 
great cities mentioned in the Bible. Nineveh, the 
capital of Assyria, was to be utterly destroyed 



20 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

" by flood and fire." It was distinctly foretold 
that " the Lord will make an utter end of the place 
thereof." Lucian, who was born on the banks of 
the river Euphrates, testifies that there was, in his 
day, no vestige of it left and that no one could 
tell where it was once situated. A later traveler 
declares that no brick nor stone nor other build- 
ing material was visible there. It has only been 
by the aid of pick and shovel that even the site of 
the once great and beautiful city has been dis- 
covered, and the remains found beneath the ground 
only make stronger the proof that the city was 
destroyed according to the word of the Lord. 

The destruction of Babylon was an exact ful- 
fillment of the prophecies against it. God called 
Cyrus by name two hundred years before he was 
born and afterwards put it into his heart to go 
up against the city to take and destroy it. You 
recall the circumstances of its capture. While 
the king, his captains and lords were engaged in 
revelry, Cyrus turned the course of the river into a 
lake and gained entrance by the river bed and 
captured and destroyed the city, according to the 
prophecy of Jeremiah, Chapter 51. " I will dry 
up thy rivers ; a snare was laid for Babylon. It 
was taken and it was not aware." Its destruction 
was to be complete. " No man was to dwell 
there," neither would " the Arabian pitch his tent 
there, neither should the shepherds make their 
folds there." " Wild beasts of the desert were to 
dwell there, doleful creatures and owls." A re;- 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 21 

cent traveler writes, " Our path lay through a 
great mass of ruined heaps on the site of shrunken 
Babylon. I am perfectly incapable of conveying 
an adequate idea of the dreary, lonely nakedness 
that appeared before us." (Porter.) " Silence 
profound as the grave reigns throughout the ruins. 
It is impossible to behold the scene and not be re- 
minded how exactly the predictions of Isaiah and 
Jeremiah have been fulfilled." (Keppel.) "Noth- 
ing would induce the Arabs to pitch their tents 
and remain all night near the principal mound, as 
they have a superstitious belief that evil spirits 
dwell there." (Mignan.) We are told that the 
place is full of doleful creatures and stagnant 
pools, and that there are there dens of wild beasts 
and that owls, hyenas, jackals and lions make 
their habitations there, fulfilling in minute detail 
the word of prophecy. 

The predictions concerning the fall of Jerusalem 
were equally minute and just as literally fulfilled. 
See Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 17. These 
prophecies were made by Christ and are an evi- 
dence at once of the inspiration of the Bible and 
of the divinity of Him who made them. They in- 
clude a great number and variety of prophecies 
concerning the holy city, all of which have been 
fulfilled. Its temple was to be destroyed, its walls 
thrown down and its inhabitants to suffer such 
tribulation as was not from the beginning of the 
world. History shows that under Titus the tem- 
ple was burned, the walls thrown down and the 



m THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

very foundations of the temple were dug up in 
the search for treasure and the place leveled and 
plowed over as a field. The slain were more than 
100,000 and the captives nearly as many. Jo- 
sephus tells us that " the calamity of the people, 
from the creation of the world, if they be compared 
with the sufferings of the Jews, will be found to be 
far surpassed by them." Titus himself acknowl- 
edged that it was due to the anger of God that 
the people had been overcome. It was God who 
drew out the Jews from their fortifications ; for 
what could the hands or engines of men do against 
such towers as these? He refused to be crowned 
in honor of the victory, declaring that he was not 
the author of this achievement but that the anger 
of God against the Jews was what put the victory 
in his hands. 

The prophecies concerning Christ Himself are 
wonderful in their minuteness and fulfillment. 
The tribe, the house, the family, the time, the 
place and the manner of His birth are all indicated 
and were all fulfilled. His place of residence, His 
forerunner, His life, His character, His miracles, 
His words, His sufferings, His being pierced, His 
betrayal for thirty pieces of silver, the casting of 
lots for His garment, the offering of vinegar, the 
escape from having His bones broken, His death 
with the wicked and His burial with the rich — 
these and many other details were foretold and 
came to pass according to the letter. No one can 
collate all of the passages which relate to the com- 






THE BIBLE FROM GOD 23 

ing Messiah, remember that they were all spoken 
hundreds of years before the events took place and 
that they were sealed up in the Hebrew language 
which became a dead language and was translated 
into the Greek 280 years before Christ, and read 
the testimony of the four evangelists as to their 
fulfillment without feeling the force of the argu- 
ment from prophecy. The contrast between all 
predictions of mere men and those spoken by God 
through men are marked. One of the wisest men 
in our Southland said that if our recent war be- 
tween the states should result as it did the city 
of New Orleans, instead of being a great commer- 
cial city, would be deserted and its wharves would 
become a place for the fishermen to spread their 
nets. So far from turning out that way, more 
cotton and grain have been marketed in that city 
and more commerce has been done there since the 
war than before. Thus we can draw the contrast 
between God's certain and man's uncertain knowl- 
edge concerning the future. Miracles are an evi- 
dence of divine power and prophecies of divine 
knowledge. The two combined go to show that 
only the All-powerful and the All-wise could have 
enabled men to do the works and speak and write 
the words ascribed to the authors of the books of 
the Bible. 

The book itself proclaims its divine origin. 
When we remember that it is made up of sixty- 
six books, composed by about forty authors, ex- 
tending from Moses to John, a period of fifteen 



24 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

hundred years, and that throughout the entire vol- 
ume there is manifest a unity of purpose, a 
harmony of teaching and statement, an elevation 
of moral and spiritual teaching superior to all 
other systems, we must look higher than the wis- 
dom of man for its origin. When we find here so 
accurately described the sins and wants of man 
and see presented a plan of salvation so well 
suited to meet and relieve all of these wants and 
pardon and cleanse away all of these sins, we can 
scarcely resist the conclusion that this book is 
from God. Every effect must have an adequate 
cause. The Bible is an effect, bearing the impress 
of infinite wisdom, holiness, goodness and truth. 
It must, therefore, have come from God. Good 
men could not and bad men would not have writ- 
ten it unaided and hence the conclusion that it 
must be from God, as claimed by those who were 
the instruments through whom God gave it. If 
this can be said of the book, what must be said of 
Him whom the book reveals? How shall we ac- 
count for the person and character of Jesus 
Christ? His historic existence is now generally 
admitted. Better deny the existence of Caesar or 
Napoleon than to question the fact of Christ's 
birth and life. Now how can you account for His 
wonderful character except that " He was in the 
beginning with God" and that " He was God"? 
His character is portrayed by the four evangelists. 
They tell us of His power and wisdom and good- 
ness. They relate what He said, what He did 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 25 

and what impression He made upon the minds 
and hearts of the men of His day. They tell us 
how they were astonished at His teaching, how 
they marvelled at His miracles, how they said, 
" He hath done all things well," " He spake as 
never man spake." " He was holy, harmless, un- 
defined and separate from sinners." They wrote 
from four different standpoints and yet they agree 
in presenting to us " a perfectly consistent char- 
acter in every trait of thought, feeling, word and 
action." They must have known Him well and 
they must have been guided by wisdom from on 
high while they wrote of Him. No other such 
character was ever held up for the love and ad- 
miration of men. He was perfect and complete 
and combined in Himself all of the virtues of a 
perfect man and all of the attributes of the infinite 
God. 

Four such men as Matthew, Mark, Luke and 
John could never have originated such a character 
as that of Jesus Christ. He must have existed in 
that day and if He existed He must have been 
both human and divine. It is a profound observa- 
tion of Hugh Miller that " no dramatist can draw 
taller men than himself." Even Rousseau con- 
fessed that " the conception and execution of such 
a character as that of Jesus Christ would be a 
greater miracle than its existence." It is easier 
to believe in the existence and divinity of Christ 
than to believe that four unlearned men could have 
conceived and drawn such a character by their 



26 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

own skill had He never existed. He must have 
been the divine being He claimed to be. He was 
too wise to be deceived and too good to deceive. 
He was and is " Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, 
today and forever, the chiefest among ten thou- 
sand and the one altogether lovely," worthy of the 
love and confidence of all who look to Him for sal- 
vation from sin. This book must be divine in its 
origin because it reveals such a God, such a Sav- 
ior and such a salvation. 

The effects of this revelation upon the lives of 
men are such as to indicate its heavenly origin. 
" By their fruits ye shall know them," was the 
rule our Savior gave by which to judge of the 
character of teachers. The same rule may be ap- 
plied to the system of truth presented in the Bible. 
Wherever it has been received as the rule of faith 
and practice its beneficial effects have been mani- 
fest. In the individual it purifies, refines and en- 
nobles. It reforms, transforms and renews, and 
makes the man who receives it a nobler and better 
man in all of the relations of life. It blesses and 
brightens the home. It elevates both man and 
woman. In the community it promotes intelli- 
gence, thrift and morality. In the world and 
among nations it leads to the highest form of 
civilization. In the Church and through its in- 
strumentality it spreads the gospel of good cheer 
and hope and courage. It refines, ennobles and 
promotes righteousness, peace and good will 
among men. Like leaven it spreads and like the 



THE BIBLE FROM GOD 27 

mustard seed it grows, and like a good tree bears 
good fruit wherever it is planted. In the early 
ages of the Church, notwithstanding the opposi- 
tion with which it met, it spread so rapidly that it 
soon made itself felt in all parts of the Roman 
empire. 

In our day it is rapidly securing its right to be 
heard and accepted in all lands of the earth. It 
is evincing its power more and more to become a 
light to lighten the Gentiles and it is yet to be- 
come the glory of the people Israel. It bears 
fruits of peace and purity, joy and salvation wher- 
ever it grows and its leaves are for the healing of 
the nations. Its effects are so beneficial that it 
must be from God, the Father of all mercies, and 
the God of all love. The Church universal ac- 
cepts it as from God. The miracles wrought by 
those who wrote it and the prophecies made by 
those who revealed it join to proclaim its heavenly 
source. The book itself and the Christ whom it 
reveals testify to the fact that it is of God. The 
fruits of its teaching in the lives of men and com- 
munities, of peoples and nations are such as to at- 
test its divine origin. 

" This is the judge that ends the strife 

Where wit and wisdom fail; 
My guide to everlasting life 
Through all this gloomy vale." 



CHAPTER III 

THE BOOKS WE HAVE ARE THE BIBLE, 
AND THEY ONLY ARE THE BIBLE 

I was once asked, by a young man, to indicate 
the reasons why certain books are held by the 
Church to be entitled to a place in the Bible and 
why certain other books are denied such a place 
— why we accept certain books as inspired and 
reject others as not inspired? The general an- 
swer to this question is that there is sufficient evi- 
dence in favor of the one class and not enough in 
behalf of the other class. This will become plain 
as we review the testimony for the books generally 
accepted as inspired and the evidence against 
those which have been denied a place in the Bible. 

When God was pleased to reveal His will to 
man He took great pains to have that revelation 
kept whole and uncorrupted. He selected the 
people Israel to be the guardians of that revela- 
tion under the former dispensation and the Church 
of Jesus Christ under the present dispensation. 
It is mentioned as one of the special honors and 
privileges of the people of Israel that " to them 
the oracles of God were committed." We are in- 
formed in Deuteronomy 31 : 25, £6, that when 

28 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 29 

Moses gave the law " He commanded the Levites, 
which bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, 
saying, Take this book of the law and put it in 
the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord 
your God that it may be there for a witness 
against thee." The ark was a chest in which the 
law, Aaron's rod and the manna were kept. 
(Hebrews 9:4.) This ark was placed in the Holy 
of holies, the most sacred place of the tabernacle, 
and afterwards of the temple, into which only the 
high priest might enter. Josephus, a learned 
Jewish historian, who lived in the age of the apos- 
tle Paul, informs us that every tribe was furnished 
with a copy of the law. Each priest and Lezite 
was provided with a copy to guide him in the 
public worship. Then, since the book contained 
the law of the land, the king, when kings arose, 
had a copy to guide him in the administration of 
the affairs of state. Hence we read in II Kings, 
22:9-11, this direction, "He shall write him a 
copy of the law in a book, out of that which is 
before the priests and Levites." Thus it appears 
that the chosen people, the priests and Levites 
and the king kept guard over the precious revela- 
tion God had given to man. The writings of 
Joshua were added to the law and deposited in 
the ark of the covenant with the law, and each 
prophet who spake in the name of the Lord 
wrought a sign to attest his claim to be a messen- 
ger from God and delivered his message that it, 
too, might be placed in the ark along with those 



SO THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

which had already been placed there for a witness 
against the people, as well as a guide to them so 
long as they desired to be guided by Jehovah. 
Thus book after book was added until the pro- 
phetic gift ceased with Malachi, to be renewed 
with the great prophet whom he predicted should 
come to prepare the way of the Lord. The uni- 
form tradition among the Jews is that Ezra, the 
scribe and an inspired man, collected the sacred 
books thus prepared that they might be preserved 
for future generations. United with him in this 
work were the members of the Great Synagogue, 
some of whom were prophets and had prepared 
some of these books, and who made copies to be 
circulated among the people. This collection of 
books was accepted as the rule of faith and prac- 
tice and was read in the synagogues every Sabbath 
day throughout the land of Palestine till the com- 
ing of Christ. Long before that time the Hebrew 
had ceased to be generally spoken and all of these 
books had been translated into Greek, as may be 
seen in the Septuagint version made 280 B. C. 
and to be found in the libraries of this day. It 
is true some other books have been added to that 
by human hands but, at the proper place, they will 
be shown to have no right to be thus associated 
with God's Word. It is beyond all dispute that 
we have in the Hebrew Bibles of today just the 
books, no more and no less, that were received, 
read and translated nearly three hundred years 
before Christ. 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 31 

Now since we have already considered the ques- 
tion of the inspiration of the Bible, the question 
which we should ask and answer is this : " Are 
the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament en- 
titled to a place in the Bible?" and the further 
question : " Are these the only books that have a 
right to such place there? " 

These two questions will be treated together for 
the reason that most of the reasons that go to 
establish the right of the one class to a place in 
the rule of faith and practice will disprove the 
right of the other class, the Apocryphal books, to 
a place in the Canon. Dr. Alexander tells us 
that the word canon is derived from a Greek word 
which literally signifies a rule and that it is so 
used in the New Testament, where Paul writes to 
the Christians at Philippi, Chapter 3 : 16, " Let 
us walk by the same rule." As the inspired books 
are the authoritative rule to regulate our faith 
and practice, the Early Fathers gave them this 
name: all such books were called Canonical. 
Irenaeus speaks of the Holy Scriptures as " the 
Canon of the Truth." Clement of Alexandria 
calls them " the True Evangelical Canon," and 
Eusebius names them " the Ecclesiastical Canon." 
Athanasius speaks of three kinds of books, " 1. 
The Canonical. £. Such as may be read. 3. 
The Apocryphal." The word Apocryphal signi- 
fies hidden, obscure, without authority. It is em- 
ployed to designate such writings as do not pos- 
sess sufficient evidence to entitle them to a place 



32 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

in the Canon. The Council of Laodicea, A. D. 
363, ordered that none but Canonical books be 
read in the churches and enumerated the books of 
the Old Testament as we have them. But the 
Council of Trent, in the sixteenth century, A. D. 
1546, included the six Apocryphal books in its 
Catalogue and since that date in all editions of 
the Bible prepared and published by the Church 
of Rome these books are included and they regard 
all copies of the Bible imperfect and mutilated 
which do not contain these books : viz, Tobit, Ju- 
dith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, and the 
two books of Maccabees. Protestants do not in- 
clude these books in the Bible and their Bible so- 
cieties do not publish them. Hence it becomes 
a matter of interest to determine what books 
ought to be included in the Canon and what should 
be excluded from it. 

Let us now review the evidence for and against 
these two classes of books, the Canonical and the 
Apocryphal. 

It is worthy of note that all of the books of 
the Old Testament which we admit were included 
in the Hebrew Bible as it existed when Christ 
came, and that none of the Apocryphal books 
were so included. Up to that time no claim had 
been set up that these latter books should be a 
part of the Bible. The Canon of the Old Testa- 
ment had been closed five hundred years before 
Christ and yet these books had never been in- 
cluded in the Bible. They were evidently written 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 33 

at a later date. Jerome, a learned man who 
translated the Old Testament from the Hebrew 
into Latin, did not recognize the right of these 
books to be in the Canon as is plain from this 
language : " This prologue of the Scriptures 
can serve as a fortified approach to all of the 
books which we translate from Hebrew into Latin ; 
so that we know that whatever is beyond these 
must be put in the Apocrypha. Therefore the 
Book of Wisdom, which is commonly entitled the 
Wisdom of Solomon, the Book of Jesus the son 
of Sirach, Judith, Tobias and Pastor, are not 
in the Canon. We omit the Book of Baruch 
which does not exist and is not read among the 
Hebrews." In his preface to Daniel he says this 
book " among the Hebrews has neither the story 
of Susannah, nor the Hymn of the Three Youths, 
nor the fables of Bel and the Dragon." In an- 
other place he says, "The songs of the Apocry- 
pha ought to be sung by dead heretics rather than 
by living ecclesiastics." (" His. Bks. of Bible," 
Stowe, pp. 544 and 580.) 

The authors of the Canonical books claim in- 
spiration while the authors of the Apocryphal 
books do not, except in the case of the author of 
Wisdom. It is attributed to Solomon, but that 
pretension is plainly refuted by the facts that it 
has quotations from Isaiah and Jeremiah who 
lived long after the days of Solomon and by the 
fact that the people of Israel are represented 
as being in subjection to their enemies, whereas 



34 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

it is known that in the reign of Solomon the Jews 
enjoyed peace and great prosperity. The men 
who were really inspired uniformly claim to speak 
for God and by His aid. For example, Moses 
informs us that God promised to " be with his 
mouth and teach him what he should say " when 
He sent him to speak unto His people and unto 
Pharaoh, king of Egypt. The prophets use the 
formula, " Thus saith the Lord," when they de- 
liver their message. They do not claim to speak 
in their own name nor by their own wisdom, but 
in the name and by the authority of God. On 
the contrary, the authors of the Apocryphal 
books speak of themselves and betray their weak- 
ness and ignorance. The author of Ecclesiasti- 
cus entreats his readers to pardon the errors he 
may have committed and concludes with these 
words, which are utterly unworthy of inspiration, 
" If I have done well it is that which I desired, 
but if slenderly and meanly it is that which I 
could attain unto." Home, p. 627. 

The contents of the two classes of writings in- 
dicate their origins. The Canonical books are 
the very embodiment of the highest truth con- 
cerning God and man and salvation ; whereas the 
Apocryphal books abound in ridiculous and in- 
credible stories. They are inconsistent with them- 
selves, and at variance with the teachings of the 
Bible. " The absurd story of Tobit, of the driv- 
ing away of the devil by the smoke of the liver of 
a certain kind of fish and the healing of the blind 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 35 

with its gall " could not have been given by in- 
spiration of God. 

Christ and His apostles sanction and quote the 
books of the Hebrew Scriptures but do not so 
sanction the Apocryphal books. The Jews divided 
the books of the Bible into three parts : The Law, 
The Prophets, and The Psalms. In Luke 24 : 44, 
Christ is represented as saying, " These are the 
words which I spake unto you while I was yet 
with you, that all things must be fulfilled which 
were written in the Law of Moses and in the 
Prophets and in the Psalms concerning me. Then 
opened He their understandings that they might 
understand the Scriptures." He bids them 
" search the Scriptures," condemns them for " not 
knowing the Scriptures " and declares that the 
Scriptures " cannot be broken." He proves His 
teachings from the Scriptures and says repeatedly 
that such and such thing came to pass " that the 
Scripture might be fulfilled." Now the Scriptures 
which He quoted, which He read in the syna- 
gogues, from which He preached and approved 
of as from God was the Hebrew Scriptures which 
the Jews of that day used and which we possess 
to this day. His apostles were equally ready to 
quote and approve the Hebrew Scriptures. Paul 
declared that " all Scripture is given by inspira- 
tion of God," and Peter said, " Prophecy came not 
in the old time by the will of man but holy men 
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 
Other New Testament writers are equally em- 



36 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

phatic in their endorsement of the Old Testament 
Scriptures. They all approve of and quote from 
the inspired books but never sanction the Apocry- 
pha. 

When we compare the Hebrew Bibles which we 
have and from which our Bible is translated, with 
those in the hands of the Jews, we find that they 
are identical, book for book and line for line, no 
more and no less. There is perfect agreement 
between the Protestant and the Jew as to the Ca- 
nonical books of the Old Testament. As Dr. 
Alexander well observed, " When we remember the 
differences that have existed between the two on 
religious beliefs we can see how the two have been 
mutually safeguards of the inspired books, to 
preserve them from alteration by one party or the 
other. We claim a place in the Canon for no 
book which they do not acknowledge to be in- 
spired and they bring no accusation against us 
for having mutilated the sacred volume by ab- 
stracting from it any book or chapter." 

These inspired books were received by the Early 

Church and the Apocryphal books were not so re- 

/ ceived for more than four hundred years and 

never admitted into the Canon till the Council of 

Trent in the sixteenth century. 

The books of the Old Testament which we have 
were given through inspired men to the Jews, by 
whom they were kept till the coming of Christ. 
He endorsed them and taught them to His apos- 
tles, who in turn taught them and commended 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 37 

them to others as the Word of God " able to make 
them wise unto salvation." Here is the meeting 
point of Jew and Gentile. Both receive the Old 
Testament as the Word of God. Hear the testi- 
mony of each. Josephus, the Jewish historian, 
gives this remarkable testimony : " We have only 
two and twenty books which are to be believed as 
of divine authority, of which five are the books of 
Moses. From the death of Moses to the reign of 
Artaxerxes, the son of Xerxes, king of Persia, 
the prophets have written thirteen books. The 
remaining four books contain hymns to God, and 
instruction of life for the use of men." In this 
enumeration the Jews reckon the twelve minor 
prophets as one book, the Book of Ruth as an ad- 
dition to Judges and Lamentation as an append- 
age to Jeremiah, thus reducing our number thirty- 
nine to their twenty-two, just the number of the 
letters in their alphabet. Turn now to the testi- 
mony of one of the early Christian writers 
Mileto, of Sardis, probably lived less than a hun- 
dred years after Josephus, went to Palestine for 
the express purpose of satisfying himself as to 
the Canon of the Old Testament and thus gives 
the result of his investigation : " I went to the 
East, and coming to the very place where these 
things were preached and transacted, I have ac- 
curately learned the books of the Old Testament. 
The names are the following," giving a list of the 
very books we have except that he seems to in- 
clude Esther in Ezra by whom some supposed it 



38 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

to have been written. Origen, A. D. 230, who 
spent much time in Palestine, and who was a fine 
Hebrew scholar, mentions all of our books with- 
out exception and gives none of the Apocryphal 
books. The two councils of Laodicea and Car- 
thage, A. D. 363 and 397, bear the same testi- 
mony. The uniform testimony of the Christian 
Church for four hundred years of its purest pe- 
riod is in favor of the inspired books which are 
contained in the Old Testament as we have it, 
and opposed to the admission of the books called 
Apocryphal books. From all of the catalogues 
made by individuals and councils in the early ages 
these books are excluded. By the best of the 
fathers they are disowned, and by the earliest 
councils they are forbidden a hearing in the 
churches. They were not allowed to be read then 
even " for example of life and instruction in man- 
ners," as was afterwards allowed, by which prac- 
tice they gradually gained a subordinate place in 
the darker days of the Church. The books which 
are contained in the Hebrew Bible, whose authors 
claimed inspiration and sustained that claim by 
signs and miracles, the books whose contents are 
so worthy of a divine origin, the books sanctioned 
by Christ and His apostles and received by the 
Early Church and certified to us by the words of 
witnesses of that day, by catalogues of individuals 
and councils, by versions and translations, these 
and these alone are the books which we believe to 
be entitled to a place in the inspired Word of God. 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 39 

The line of reasoning by which the Canonicity 
of the books of the New Testament is established 
is very similar to that by which it has been sought 
to show that the books contained in the Old Tes- 
tament have a right to be there. In addition to 
the evidences of the inspiration of these books as 
given in the former chapter the following outline 
embraces the principal evidences of their claim 
to a place in the Canon as well as the main reasons 
why other books are not entitled to a place there. 
The twenty-seven books are now in the New Tes- 
tament, are now admitted as a part of the Canon 
and no others have ever been so admitted. Their 
presence must be accounted for and the absence 
of others explained. The former won a place 
there by the character and qualifications of their 
authors. They were men of God who came to re- 
veal His will. As they wrought their miracles by 
His power so they revealed truth through His 
wisdom and under the influence of His Spirit. 
Their messages were received as the messages of 
God to man and were, by unanimous consent, 
given a place in the Canon. Other books failed 
to win such a place because they did not pre- 
sent sufficient evidence. 

The authors of the books of the New Testa- 
ment, like those of the Old, uniformly claim to be 
speaking for God. Both Paul and Peter speak of 
themselves as apostles of Jesus Christ. An apos- 
tle is one who had seen Christ, one who had the 
power of working miracles and one inspired to 



40 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

reveal God's will. Luke says (Acts 1 : 1, 2, 4, 8), 
" The former treatise have I made, O Theophelus, 
of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until 
the day in which He was taken up, after that He 
through the Holy Ghost, had given commandment 
unto the apostles whom He had chosen." He tells 
us what that command was in the fourth verse 
and in the eighth verse says, " Ye shall receive 
power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon 
you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in 
Jerusalem and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and 
unto the uttermost parts of the earth." In the 
second chapter he tells how " they were all filled 
with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with 
other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance." 
No such claim was either made or verified by any 
of those who wrote the obscure books which might 
be candidates for admission into the Canon. 

The substance and form of the contents of the 
New Testament are such as to confirm the claim 
of the authors. No one who reads the New Tes- 
tament can fail to be impressed with the sublimity 
of its moral and spiritual teachings, and no one 
who reads the Apocryphal gospels and epistles 
can refuse to admit that they are in many respects 
puerile, and in all respects far inferior to the writ- 
ings of the apostles and evangelists. 

The people who early heard and read what these 
men of God wrote and said, and who witnessed 
the miracles they wrought were many of them con- 
vinced that they were from God, and gave their 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 41 

testimony in their behalf. The Early Church 
received the Gospels, the Acts and the Epistles 
as a revelation of God's will. They and those 
who followed them in the course of time read them 
in their churches, appealed to them in their dis- 
cussions, enrolled them in their catalogues along 
with the Canonical books of the Old Testament 
and endorsed them in their councils and treated no 
other books after the same manner. Christ and 
His apostles gave their sanction to this part of 
the Bible equally with the other part. God had 
said of Christ, " This is my beloved Son in whom 
I am well pleased; hear ye Him." When Christ 
entered upon His work He said (John 12:49), 
" The Father which sent me, He gave me a com- 
mandment what I should say and what I should 
speak." To the unbelieving Jews He said (John 
5 : 46-47), " Had ye believed Moses ye would have 
believed me for he wrote of me. But if ye be- 
lieve not his writings how can ye believe my 
words ? " He promised guidance to His apostles 
on four different occasions according to the words 
in Matthew 10:19, 20, "But when they deliver 
you up take no thought how or what ye shall 
speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour 
what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, 
but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in 
you." He gave them power to work miracles that 
men might believe their claim to teach in God's 
name. Five out of the eight New Testament 
writers were apostles, Matthew, Peter, James, 



42 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

John and Jude, who could thus attest their teach- 
ings. Luke was an intimate companion of Paul 
and Mark of Peter. Luke 10:7 is quoted as 
Scripture by Paul in I Timothy 5: 18, " The la- 
borer is worthy of his hire." Papias, Justin, 
Irenaeus and Origen all speak of Mark's gospel 
as received and as having been dictated and sanc- 
tioned by Peter. (See also Hebrew 1:1, I John 
4:1, II Peter 3:15, 16.) Thus Christ and His 
apostles teach us that the words they spake are 
entitled to a place in the rule of faith equally with 
the words of Moses and the Prophets. 

The general agreement of the Christian Church 
from the days of Christ to the present, in the re- 
ception of all of the books of the New Testament, 
furnishes a strong evidence in favor of their right 
to a place in the Bible. Each book or message 
or letter was examined on its own merits by the 
Early Church and admitted to a place among its 
sacred writings. 

These books were publicly read in the churches 
so that they could easily have been challenged 
had they not been genuine. Paul directs that his 
epistle to the Colossians be read in the church of 
Laodicea and that the Colossians read that from 
Laodicea. Justin Martyr and Tertullian both 
bear witness to the fact that at their meetings on 
the first day of the week they " read the Prophets 
and the Scriptures." 

The books of the New Testament are constantly 
appealed to and quoted by the early Christian 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 43 

Fathers in discussing any point of faith or in in- 
culcating any line of duty. They evidently re- 
garded them of supreme authority in all matters 
of faith and practice. They admitted these and 
only these to a place in the Canon of the New 
Testament. 

Catalogues of these books were formed, from a 
very early day, both by individuals and councils 
that others might see and know what books they 
regarded as inspired. Such lists were made by 
Origen, Jerome, Eusebius and others and by the 
councils of Laodicea and Carthage. These cor- 
respond with the lists of the books in our Bibles. 
Out of thirteen such lists seven agree perfectly 
with our Canon and several others differ only in 
the omission of the book of Revelation because it 
had fallen into some discredit on account of the 
use made of it by the " Millenarians," but the 
sober thought of the Church has continued to 
credit the full inspiration of this beautiful book 
by the apostle John. It would extend this subject 
too far to take up the evidences as to each sepa- 
rate book. You will find such treatment in Alex- 
ander, Home or Angus. These books and these 
alone are supported in their claim to inspiration 
by miracles wrought and testified to by credible 
witnesses, by prophecies made and fulfilled to the 
letter, by the character, harmony and holiness of 
their teaching, by the character of the Christ and 
by the influence exerted upon the individual, the 
home, the nation and the world. 



44 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

No books but these can present such claims to 
a place in the Bible as may be seen in such facts 
as these: viz, they have had their place from the 
time of the apostle John, who outlived the other 
apostles and doubtless gave his attention and 
guidance in the settlement of the New Testament 
Canon ; their authors, conscious that they spake 
under the influence of the Spirit, claimed to be 
from God and wrought miracles to attest that 
claim ; that Christ and His inspired apostles put 
these teachings on precisely the same basis of in- 
spiration as the Old Testament; that the Early 
Church and the Church universal has received 
these books and only these as having a right to a 
place in the Canon of the New Testament, and 
has handed down to us lists, versions and exposi- 
tions of these books of eternal life. Other books 
may be good in their place, but when it comes to 
a direct, authoritative communication from God 
to man, as to duty and salvation, we must turn 
to the books of this Bible, whose authors " spake 
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." If this 
book be inspired and the books it contains have a 
right to a place there, with what reverence we 
should receive and with what diligence and earnest- 
ness we should read and study its holy pages! 

" Holy Bible, book divine, 
Precious treasure, thou art mine; 
Mine to tell me whence I came, 
Mine to teach me what I am; 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 45 

" Mine to chide me when I rove, 
Mine to show a Savior's love; 
Mine art thou, to guide my feet, 
Mine, to judge, condemn, acquit; 

" Mine, to comfort in distress, 
If the Holy Spirit bless; 
Mine, to show by living faith, 
Man can triumph over death; 

" Mine to tell of joys to come, 
And the rebel sinner's doom: 
Holy Bible, book divine, 
Precious treasure, thou art mine." 



CHAPTER IV 

THE BIBLE THE RULE OF FAITH 
AND PRACTICE 

To everyone who claims allegiance to God and 
who accepts the Bible as the inspired revelation 
of His will there can be but one supreme rule of 
faith and practice. That rule is the Word of 
God. This lesson needs to be enforced no less 
now than in the day when the prophet Isaiah 
wrote, " To the Law and the Testimony ; if they 
speak not according to this Word, it is because 
there is no light in them." The prediction had 
been made that the time would come when the peo- 
ple of God would be tempted to turn away from 
the testimony of the Lord and look for wisdom 
and guidance from those who sought after " fa- 
miliar spirits " ; when the}^ should no longer look 
to God alone for guidance and direction but should 
seek other means of gaining a knowledge of truth 
and duty. Hence God warns them against this 
temptation and enforces upon them a strict rule 
as to the use of His Law as their guide in truth 
and duty. If they should be invited by their 
neighbors to seek after wizards and familiar spir- 
its they were to answer, " Should not a people 

46 



OUR RULE 47 

seek after their God? " Had they not sworn alle- 
giance to Jehovah? Were they not enjoying 
blessings at His hands? Had He not guided them 
wisely and well thus far? Would it not be folly 
to turn away from Him to serve other gods or to 
consult those who pretended to communicate with 
the Devil, and with other wicked spirits? Should 
they speak in behalf of the living to the dead? 
On the contrary, should they not hear the voice of 
the Lord their God as He commanded them to ap- 
ply to the " Law and Testimony " for a knowledge 
of His revealed will? If any teachers should come 
unto them not speaking according to this Word, 
they might be sure there was no light in them, that 
they had not been taught of God, that they were 
still in the darkness of ignorance and sin. To fol- 
low such teachers would lead them away from God, 
the source of life and light, into darkness and 
death. To the " Law and Testimony " of God, 
then, they were to resort as being the true and 
only rule of faith and practice. In opposition to 
all other methods of arriving at a knowledge of 
what should be received as true, God commands 
the people to apply to His Word as the only law- 
ful source of spiritual knowledge and as the sole 
and sufficient rule of faith and practice. 

At that time the law and other portions of God's 
revealed Word had been given to the people and 
that was declared to be the only legitimate rule 
by which they should decide what was right and 
true. To the revelation which was in the posses- 



48 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

sion of the Church at that period God was pleased 
to add much more both in the Old and the New 
Testaments. He fully endorsed as true and Ca- 
nonical all that had been placed in the Bible up 
to the time when He came on earth in human form. 
He then inspired men to write down His own 
words and to make still further revelations of His 
will. All of these writings were, in His provi- 
dence, placed together and, from the earliest days 
of Christianity, have been received as parts of 
God's revealed will. If it was then a law of God's 
spiritual kingdom that no one should go out- 
side of this divine revelation in order to learn 
what to believe and practice, it is still the law 
of that kingdom. God has made a clear and 
sufficient revelation of His will to man and re- 
quires him to find in that alone what he should 
believe concerning God and what duty God re- 
quires of him. This is a most important position 
for every church and for every individual that 
would do that which is acceptable in the sight of 
the Lord God of heaven. To every church and 
for every individual the Bible should be the sole 
and sufficient rule of faith and practice. And yet, 
plain and obvious as this teaching seems to be, 
it has frequently been overlooked. There is in the 
human heart a constant tendency to turn away 
from God and follow that which is human and sin- 
ful. Man is prone to set up his opinion as a guide 
rather than to submit himself to the will and au- 
thority of God as made known in His Word. 



OUR RULE 49 

Even the Church has not been free from the power 
and influence of this tendency. At certain periods 
of her history she has seemed to forget this direc- 
tion, and has assumed to herself the authority to 
decree rites, enforce rules and lay down terms of 
membership not authorized in the Word of God. 
The early ministers of the gospel, ordained by 
Christ Himself, were scarcely in their graves be- 
fore men arose and taught for doctrines the com- 
mandments of men. Men arose who lorded it over 
the consciences of their fellowmen and soon re- 
duced the free Church of God to a spiritual des- 
potism, and made merchandise of the most holy 
privileges and offices of the Church. By failing 
to adhere to the rule God had given, the Church 
sold herself to the state and elevated Constantine 
the Great to the chief place in the Church as well 
as in the state. The consequence was that, while 
the Church was no longer persecuted and enjoyed 
an outward appearance of prosperity, she was 
shorn of her spiritual power and grew more and 
more corrupt, until in the Dark Ages she almost 
forfeited her right to be called the Church of 
Christ. This she did sometimes by allowing the 
state to rule and control her affairs and at other 
times by seeking to manage the affairs of the state. 
In both ways she violated the constitution which 
gave her a right to exist and forgot the declara- 
tion of the great Head of the Church when He 
said, " My kingdom is not of this world." 

During all of this long and dreary time of dark- 



50 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ness there were many who always refused to bow 
the knee to Baal and who, in the face of the most 
bitter persecution, witnessed for Christ and for 
His truth, and who sought earnestly to pre- 
serve His Church pure and unmixed with the af- 
fairs of the state. There is good evidence for be- 
lieving that there never was a time when there 
were not men who were willing to lay down their 
lives for Christ and for the word of His truth, that 
even in the darkest days of the Dark Ages there 
were in the valleys of the Piedmont and in the 
hills of Scotland and in parts of Ireland many 
who never did submit to the degenerate rule of the 
times, but maintained the doctrines and govern- 
ment of the New Testament pure and unadulter- 
ated. We find examples of such persons in the 
Waldensian Church, whose representative said in 
the Presbyterian Council, a few years ago, that 
they were not " informed " because they had never 
been " ^formed " ; in the Culdee Church with its 
representative form of church government, and in 
that church in Ireland that had a bishop for each 
of its 365 churches. Still it must be admitted 
that the vast majority of those who at that time 
claimed to be Christ's representatives on the earth 
gave to the world a very deformed picture of the 
life and teaching of Him who was " meek and 
lowly in spirit " and " holy, harmless and undefiled 
and separate from sinners." The reason why 
they were so far astray was that they had for- 
saken the word of His truth and substitute^ in its 



OUR RULE 51 

stead the traditions and opinions of men. They 
left the light of God's truth and sought to regu- 
late the kingdom of Christ according to the princi- 
ples and maxims of the world. They neglected to 
hear and heed the divine command, " To the Law 
and Testimony." 

It was not till Luther and Calvin and others of 
that day came to listen to this command and to 
believe that this book was intended of God for 
the people as well as for the priests, that there was 
brought about the much needed reformation in 
the Church. Then it was that the departures of 
the Church from the rule of faith were brought to 
light under the bright shining of the truth of God 
as it beamed forth from the pages of His Holy 
Word. It was then that first one evil and then 
another were banished from the Church until at last 
it was thought that she was comparatively free from 
the commandments of men, but subsequent events 
showed that the state was unwilling to give up her 
part in the management of the Church, and the 
Church was unwilling to be released entirely from 
the state and to conform herself fully to the Word 
of God, without any regard to the traditions of 
man. Against both Church and state there arose 
men who claimed that the state had no right to 
interfere with religion, and that each man should 
be permitted to take the Bible as the sole and suf- 
ficient rule of faith and practice, and that he had 
also the right to read and study that book and 
decide for himself in the fear of God what it 



52 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

taught him to believe, to do, and to hope. In 
other words, that the Bible was the only infallible 
rule of faith and practice and that each individual 
had the right of private judgment as to what it 
taught and liberty to believe and live according 
to that teaching. This is the position of the 
Protestant Church. Luther translated and gave 
the Bible to the people. Calvin said, " We must 
come to the Word. If we deviate from it, though 
we run with celerity, we will be out of course and 
will not reach the goal. The way to the divine 
countenance and favor is a labyrinth, so that un- 
less we are guided by the line of the Word we can- 
not approach unto God." And Bishop Chilling- 
worth said, " The Bible is the religion of Protes- 
tants." The Westminster Assembly in its Con- 
fession of Faith said : " The whole counsel of 
God, concerning all things necessary for His own 
glory, man's salvation, faith and life, is either 
expressly set down in Scripture or may by good 
and necessary consequences be deduced from 
Scripture; unto which nothing at any time is to 
be added." " And the authority of the Scriptures, 
for which it ought to be believed and obeyed, de- 
pendeth not upon the testimony of any man or 
church, but wholly upon God the author thereof; 
and therefore it is to be received because it is the 
Word of God." And, " The supreme judge, by 
which all controversies of religion are to be de- 
cided . . . can be none other but the Holy Spirit 
speaking in the Scripture." This position is in 



OUR RULE 53 

exact harmony with the teaching of the Bible it- 
self. It claims to lead men to God and to eternal 
life. It claims to be given by inspiration of God 
and to be " able to make thee wise unto salvation." 
(II Timothy 3: 15.) This claim the experience of 
hundreds and thousands of God's people confirm. 
They were in darkness and sorrow. They came to 
this revelation of the will of God for their salva- 
tion and found light and comfort and salvation. 

The Bible contains all that needs to be known 
for the salvation of our souls and the regulation 
of our lives. Here we may learn the doctrines 
of grace, the government of the Church and the 
worship of the sanctuary. Hence God expects 
His Church and each member of it to learn from 
the Bible what he is to believe concerning Him and 
what duty He requires of him. 

There is no other such book as the Bible. No 
other book can compare with it in the character 
of its teaching, the purity and harmony of its 
purpose or in effect upon life and character. No 
other is sustained by such an array of evidence 
for inspiration. Its success in winning a place 
of power and influence over the hearts and lives 
of men, the miracles wrought to attest the claims 
to inspiration of those who wrote it, its prophecies 
made and fulfilled, and the suitableness to our 
needs of the salvation which it offers, and the 
Christ whom it makes known, all attest it to be a 
revelation from the living and true God. As, 
therefore, we would listen to our King, we should 



54 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

heed the teaching of His Word. It is the divine 
constitution of His Church. It is the statute 
book of His spiritual commonwealth. It is the 
Guide-book of travelers from time to eternity. It 
is the sole and sufficient rule and revelation of 
God's will. 

It follows that every thing contrary to this holy 
Word is sinful and wrong. Sin is lawlessness. 
Anything that does not come up to the require- 
ments of the law is sin and anything that goes 
beyond what the law allows is sin. This law re- 
quires truth in the heart and love to God and man 
to their fullest degree and, therefore, any want 
of conformity unto this law in thought, or feeling, 
or motive, or word, or deed is sin. This law for- 
bids all crimes against man and all offenses against 
God and, therefore, all transgression of His law is 
sin. 

It follows also that " nothing besides " or in 
addition to this Word can be made a law by the 
Church to bind the conscience. God alone is the 
Lawgiver and He is to be the final Judge of the 
quick and the dead. His law is perfect and suf- 
ficient for the regulation of the affairs of His 
kingdom and for the guidance of His subjects. 
The Church is not appointed to make laws. It 
must keep, and teach and interpret the law, but is 
not allowed to add anything to it nor to take any- 
thing away from it. It may press home the teach- 
ings of the law upon the conscience and enforce 
the law by the means which God has ordained. 



i 



OUR RULE 55 

But the Church may not make rules and regula- 
tions not authorized in the Bible, nor may she de- 
cree rites and ceremonies not taught there. 

The Church must teach and spread the doctrines 
she finds revealed in this Word but may add no 
others. She may set up the government taught 
by Christ and His apostles but should attempt no 
other. She should teach and keep the sacraments 
taught in the Word, but has no authority to 
change these nor to add others. She should ex- 
pound the terms of church membership given by 
Christ and His apostles, but should require no 
more and no less. She should insist, according to 
the Bible, that men in their moral conduct should 
deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and that they 
should live soberly, righteously and godly in this 
present evil world " and that they should love the 
Lord their God with all of their hearts, with all of 
their minds, with all of their souls, and with all 
of their strength, and their neighbors as them- 
selves " — this much, no more and no less. She 
should insist upon the worship of God as author- 
ized in the Bible but not otherwise. In short, since 
the Bible is a perfect and complete rule of faith 
and practice, men should study it diligently and 
seek to conform their belief and practice to its 
teachings as to doctrine, government, worship, 
sacraments and life. Thus will they be saved 
from rationalism which would come with its pre- 
conceived opinions and seek to make the teachings 
of God conform to their views, from ritualism 



56 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

which would cover over the simple worship of the 
gospel with forms and ceremonies, and from will 
worship which would attempt to please God by 
offering sacrifices and worship which He hath not 
required nor approved. Thus will men be induced 
to read and study the Bible that they may know 
the truth which God hath revealed for their salva- 
tion and spiritual benefit. Thus will they learn 
the way of life and have awakened in their hearts 
a desire to spread the knowledge of divine truth. 
If, then, you have learned any important truth or 
duty, you are under obligation to communicate it 
to others. If, then, you have learned to know the 
way of life, teach it to others. If you understand 
the plan of salvation, try to make it plain to those 
who do not know it. If you have received the 
news of salvation, tell it to others till all know the 
way, till every knee shall bow and every tongue 
confess that Christ is Lord to the glory of the 
Father — till the kingdoms of this world become 
the kingdoms of our Lord and of His anointed. 



CHAPTER V 
GOD, HIS EXISTENCE AND ATTRIBUTES 

The existence of God lies at the foundation of 
all true religion and the knowledge of God is es- 
sential to all acceptable worship. If there were 
no God there would be no religion, and if there 
were no knowledge of God there could be no true 
worship. Not ignorance but intelligence is the 
mother of devotion. The better we know God the 
more we will love and the better we will serve Him. 
" This is life eternal that they might know thee, 
the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou 
hast sent." 

It is true that our knowledge of God cannot 
be full and complete, yet it may be sufficient. 
While we cannot comprehend God we may appre- 
hend Him. We can know that He exists and that 
He is wise and powerful and good and that " He 
is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." 

That there is one infinite and eternal First 
Cause, Creator and Maker of all things is plain 
to all whose minds are not blinded and whose 
hearts are not hardened by sin. Only the fool 
hath said in his heart there is no God, and even 

he hath said this not for lack of evidence but for 

57 



58 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

lack of willingness to acknowledge that there is 
one to whom he must at last give account. The 
evidences which unite w T ith the Bible in teaching 
the existence of God are many and strong. Each 
leads up to God and all combine to prepare the 
mind to accept readily the plain and direct teach- 
ing of the Word. 

The very fact that the mind of man has con- 
ceived and continued along the ages to entertain 
the idea of God is a presumptive evidence in favor 
of the existence of God. Unless such an ideal ex- 
ists, how are we to explain the rise of such an 
idea? Man could not think of God unless there 
were a God to think about. Again, it is a law of 
the mind that every effect must have an adequate 
cause. When we behold ourselves, the earth, the 
heavens and the sea, we conclude that all of these 
effects must have had a cause, and as no human 
power can create the smallest plant or flower it 
must have been an Omnipotent Being who caused 
all of the wonderful effects of heaven and earth 
and sea to come into existence. These things 
could not have come by chance. They could not 
have just happened. They must have sprung 
from the creative mind and power of the infinite 
God. Only God could create and preserve all the 
number and variety of effects which we behold 
around us. As it is written, " Every house is 
built by some one. But He that built all things is 
God." " The heavens declare the glory of God 
and the firmament showeth forth His handy work. 






GOD 59 

Day unto day and night unto night showeth 
knowledge of Him." 

On every side we see unmistakable evidences of 
design. Thus we are taught not only that there 
is a God, but that He is wise and powerful and 
good. Behold evidences of such design and wis- 
dom in the structure of each plant and animal, 
each night and day, each season of the year 
and in the adaptation of all things to the welfare 
and happiness of man. See how He has adapted 
the light to the eye, the air to the lungs, food to 
the body, truth to the mind, love to the heart, 
authority to the will and law to the conscience. 
Wherever there is design there must be a designer 
— wherever there is law there must be a lawgiver. 

The constitution of our own moral nature is 
such as to lead us to infer the moral character of 
God. It is true that our souls have been per- 
verted by sin. Still the soul retains enough of its 
original nature to indicate that it came from God. 
On examination we find that pleasure follows upon 
the performance of actions which are virtuous, and 
that pain accompanies the doing of that which we 
know to be wrong. We are thus reminded that 
the Being by whom we were made ordained that 
virtue should be rewarded and vice punished. He 
must, therefore, be just and upright who ordained 
this law. 

We find that there is within every soul a faculty 
which not only distinguishes between the right and 
the wrong, but causes certain forebodings lest the 



60 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

evil which we have done shall bring upon us not 
only present pain but future punishment, and that 
the good which we do not only gives pleasure in 
the present but meets the approval of the highest 
good. We are thus reminded to reverence Him by 
whom we were made and to stand in awe of Him 
as of an upright judge. 

Then when we reflect that both human society 
and civil government frown upon that which is 
wrong and approve that which is right, we are led 
to believe that God, by whom these were ordained, 
will surely punish the evil and reward the good. 
" Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? " 
" Yes," our conscience replies, " ' He will render 
unto every man according to his deeds and He will 
by no means clear the guilty,' but ' will bring every- 
thing into judgment.' " " God shall bring every 
work into judgment, with every secret thing, 
whether it be good or whether it be evil." (Ec- 
clesiastes 12: 14.) 

The fact that these ideas of God and of right 
and wrong are universal — that no nation, tribe 
or people has ever been found where there was not 
some idea of God and retribution — plainly shows 
that God not only exists, but that He has so re- 
vealed Himself that men are without excuse if they 
do not worship and serve Him as their Lord and 
their God. " Because that which may be known 
of God is manifest in them, for God hath shewed 
it unto them. For the invisible things of Him 
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, 



GOD 61 

being understood by the things that are made, 
even His eternal power and Godhead ; so that they 
are without excuse." (Romans 1:19, 20.) 

This conclusion is verified by the plain and ex- 
plicit teachings of the Bible. " For there is one 
God ; and there is none other but He." (Mark 
12:32.) " In the beginning God created the 
heaven and the earth." (Genesis 1:1.) "All 
things were made by Him and without Him was not 
anything made that was made." (John 1:3.) 
" He that cometh to God must believe that He is 
and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently 
seek Him." (Hebrews 11 : 6.) 

From the Bible we learn that while there is but 
one only living and true God — one in divine es- 
sence and one in divine plan and purpose — that 
this one infinite Being exists in a threefold mani- 
festation or personality, the Father, the Son and 
the Holy Ghost. There are two sets of passages 
which reveal at once the unity and the diversity 
in the Godhead. If in the single soul of man there 
be discovered three distinct modes of conscious- 
ness, the power to think, the power to feel and the 
power to will, and yet the unity of the soul is not 
destroyed, we should not be surprised to find that 
in the Godhead there is but one divine essence and 
yet three manifestations of that essence in the 
persons we call the Father, the Son and the Holy 
Ghost. 

Turn to the Word of God and hear both the 
unity and the diversity of the Godhead taught. 



62 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

" The Lord our God is one God." (Mark 12 : 29.) 
" Thou shalt have no other gods before me." 
(Exodus 20: 3.) " Who hath declared this from 
the ancient time? Who hath told it from that 
time? Have not I the Lord? And there is no 
God else beside me ; a just God and a Savior ; there 
is none beside me." (Isaiah 45 : 21, 22.) " I and 
my father are one." The perfect harmony in na- 
ture, in revelation, in providence and in the plan 
of redemption indicates that there is but one in- 
finite Cause, Creator, Preserver and Ruler over all 
things in heaven and in earth. 

There are other passages which teach with equal 
definiteness that this one divine essence manifests 
itself in three different modes. These modes or 
manifestations are called persons, not in the sense 
that they are separate and independent individuals, 
but that each has a name, a relation and a prop- 
erty peculiar to itself, and that each has the 
power of intelligent thought, will and action. To 
each the personal pronouns, I, thou, and he, are 
applied and to each the names, attributes, works 
and worship of God are ascribed. Each is a per- 
son and yet each is of the same divine essence 
united in the Godhead as one God. This has been 
illustrated in this way: 

" Light is one substance with three properties, the 
actinic, luminiferous and calorific. The properties of 
light are distinct but they can not be separated from 
each other. Where the one is the others are. The 
actinic can neither be seen nor felt. The calorific can 



GOD 63 

not be seen but may be felt. The luminiferous is 
both seen and felt, and is the revelation and expres- 
sion of the other two. Light is one and yet three. 
Light is three and yet one. 

"Holy Scripture says: 'God is Light.' God is 
one substance yet three persons — Father, Son and 
Holy Spirit. The personalities are distinct but they 
can not be separated from each other. Where the 
one is the others are. Where the Father is the Son 
and Spirit are. Where the Son is the Father and 
Spirit are. Where the Spirit is the Father and Son 
are. The Father can neither be seen nor felt. The 
Spirit can not be seen but may be felt. The Son 
may be both seen and felt and is the revelation and 
expression of the other two. What an absurdity to 
reject any two of the properties and call the remain- 
ing one light! What an absurdity to reject any two 
of the persons and call the remaining one God. God 
is one and yet three, God is three and yet one." 

The names given to these modes of divine essence 
are, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. 
The peculiar property of the Father is that the 
Father begets, the Son is begotten and the Spirit 
proceeds, or paternity, filiation and procession. 
" These properties distinguish the persons of the 
Trinity so that we can speak of one without, at 
the same time, speaking of another." 

In function, while it is always God acting, the 
Father is represented as sending and the Son as 
coming and the Spirit as proceeding. The Father 
provides the plan of redemption, the Son executes 
and the Holy Spirit applies it to the hearts and 



64 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

lives of men. The Father sends the Son. The 
Father and the Son send the Spirit and the Spirit 
proceeds from both. While, therefore, each is 
equally divine and each partakes equally of the di- 
vine essence, yet each has His peculiar name, prop- 
erty and function and each manifests the divine es- 
sence in the discharge of certain acts separate and 
distinct from those of the others. For example 
the Father says of the Son, " This is my beloved 
Son in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him." 
The Son says, " My meat and my drink is to do 
the will of my Father," and referring to the Holy 
Spirit He says, " I will send you another comforter 
that he may abide with you forever," and " He 
shall guide you into all truth." Hence when the 
apostles were sent forth they were to recognize 
this distinction in the Trinity by baptizing " in 
the name of the Father and of the Son and of the 
Holy Ghost," and in pronouncing the benediction 
they were to say, " The grace of the Lord Jesus 
Christ, the love of God and the communion of the 
Holy Ghost be with you all, Amen." (II Corinthi- 
ans 13: 14.) That there are mysteries connected 
with this subject is freely admitted, for God is a 
mystery and life is a mystery and man is a mystery 
and we are surrounded by mysteries. While it is 
above reason it is not contrary to reason that 
there should be variety in unity and unity in va- 
riety in the Godhead, when we behold such unity 
and variety in nature, in man and in everything 
which God has made. Let us ever continue to bow 



GOD 65 

reverently before God the Father, God the Son, 
and God the Holy Spirit, one God in substance, 
one in purpose and one in glory, power and holi- 
ness. 

The attributes of God are those qualities or 
properties which constitute Him the Being that 
He is. If any one of them were lacking He would 
not be God. All of these combined and all inher- 
ing in the divine essence go to make up our ideal 
of the great Being whom we love and serve as " a 
spirit, infinite, eternal and unchangeable in His 
being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness 
and truth." According to this definition, which is 
based on the Bible, God is a spirit and has not a 
body like men. He is expressly called a spirit by 
the Savior in His interview with the woman of 
Samaria : " God is a spirit and they that worship 
Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth." 
(John 4:23.) He is called the Father of our 
spirits and the Framer of our bodies and we are 
taught that man was made, originally, in the like- 
ness of God. That likeness was not a bodily but 
a spiritual likeness. The soul of man was en- 
dowed by its Creator with the power of thought, 
feeling and will, and was made like God in knowl- 
edge, righteousness and true holiness, with domin- 
ion over the creature which God had made upon 
the earth. If our spirits be capable of thought, 
feeling and will in a finite degree the spirit of 
God must be capable of thinking, feeling and will- 
ing in an infinite degree. We know that we do 



66 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

think and feel and will and infer with confidence 
that the God who made us possesses like powers — 
that He is a spirit and has all of the properties of 
a personal agent. God is a spirit. He is a per- 
sonal spirit and while one in divine essence, He ex- 
ists in a threefold personality. It is further evi- 
dent that He is infinite, for to have created all 
things out of nothing required infinite wisdom and 
power. To give life to a single plant is far be- 
yond the power of the greatest and wisest philoso- 
pher on earth. How much more then would in- 
finite power be required to bring into existence and 
to sustain, when made, the world in which we live 
and the system of which it is but a small member? 
God is infinite, without limits or boundaries in His 
being and in His attributes. He fills all space 
with His immensity, so that He is in every place be- 
holding the good and the evil. He is both omni- 
present and omniscient. It was such a view of 
God which so impressed the Psalmist when he 
wrote : " Whither shall I go from thy spirit or 
whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I as- 
cend up into heaven thou art there; if I make my 
bed in hell, behold thou art there. If I take the 
wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost 
parts of the sea ; even there shall thy hand lead 
me and thy right hand uphold me." (Psalm 
139:7.) 

God is likewise eternal. There never was a 
time in the eternity past when God did not exist 
and there will never be a time in the eternity fu- 



GOD 67 

ture when God shall cease to exist. " From ever- 
lasting to everlasting thou art God." 

He is unchangeable. This follows from His 
perfection. If he were imperfect he would have 
to change his plans either because he could not 
foresee what would arise or because he could not 
provide for that which had arisen. But being 
infinite, He knows beforehand everything that can 
possibly happen and is able to meet and over- 
come each and every difficulty or enemy. " I am 
Jehovah ; I change not ; therefore ye sons of Ja- 
cob are not consumed." He is " the same yester- 
day, today and forever." 

He is infinite in His wisdom. He not only 
knows all things but He knows how to use the best 
means for the accomplishment of the wisest ends 
and purposes. His wisdom was displayed in His 
works of creation, providence and redemption. 

It required infinite wisdom to make all things 
that are in the heavens above, in the earth be- 
neath and in the waters under the earth; it re- 
quired infinite wisdom to preserve and govern all 
creatures in all of their ways ; but it required the 
greatest wisdom to devise and bring to completion 
that plan by which lost sinners could be rescued 
and saved from the guilt and power and pollution 
of sin and be brought back into the family of God 
and made heirs of the inheritance of the saints in 
light. 

He is infinite in His power. This power was 
made known in His creation of all things out of 



68 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

nothing by the word of His power. To bring 
something out of nothing seems incredible to 
man, but God spake and worlds sprang into ex- 
istence and sun and moon and stars took their 
places in the firmament of heaven and have, ever 
since, been kept there and made to move in per- 
fect harmony in the orbits to which God assigned 
them, forever singing as they shine, " The hand 
that made us is divine." 

To govern the material and spiritual universe 
requires the infinite power of God; and to meet 
and overcome all of the spiritual foes of God and 
man demands the infinite power of Jehovah. 
Hence He who undertook our redemption had to 
be able to say, " All power in heaven and on earth 
is in my hands." 

He is infinite in His holiness. No stain of sin 
is on His spotless character. He is " holy, harm- 
less, undefiled and separate from sinners and made 
higher than the heavens." Before His face the 
holy angels of Heaven veil their faces and cry, 
" Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts — the 
whole earth is full of thy glory." 

He is perfectly just. He holds the balances 
with a perfectly even hand. As the eternal judge 
of the quick and the dead He will surely do right. 
He will by no means clear the guilty but will " ren- 
der unto every man according to his deeds." 

He is infinitely good. His goodness is that 
disposition of His nature which prompts Him to 
bestow well-being upon all of His creatures so 



GOD 69 

far as He can do so without violating His law 
and doing violence to His other attributes. It 
includes His mercy, which is goodness exercised 
toward the guilty and sinful and unworthy. His 
goodness was shown in creating man in His own 
image and in surrounding Him with so many 
things to administer to his comfort and pleasure. 
It was shown in sparing the sinner after he dis- 
owned his God and so forfeited all right to His 
Love and favor. It was shown in the blessings 
which were scattered along the way of life. It 
was shown in the gift of His Son to be a savior 
of the lost sinner. It was shown in the rich pro- 
vision of grace by which the sinner is saved from 
the guilt and power and pollution of sin, and it is 
shown in the beauty, happiness, holiness and se- 
curity of the home into which He hath promised 
to bring all who put their trust in Him. 

He is infinite in His truth. Because of His 
fidelity we can trust the senses with which He has 
endowed us. We can expect the regular return 
of the seasons. We can depend upon the coming 
of night and day and may confidently believe that 
the world will never again be destroyed by flood. 
We can expect Him always in the future, as al- 
ways in the past, to be true to His covenant prom- 
ise. It was because of His faithfulness to His 
covenant that the sons of Jacob were not con- 
sumed when they sinned against Him. It was 
because of His fidelity to His covenant of grace 
that all men were not lost when they despised the 



70 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

covenant for their salvation through Jesus Christ, 
the gift of the Father's love. It is because of His 
faithfulness that we have not all been cut off for 
our sins and inconsistencies. So that the God 
whom we worship " is a spirit, infinite, eternal and 
unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power, holi- 
ness, goodness and truth." 

This infinite God sustains certain intimate re- 
lations to us out of which spring certain impor- 
tant duties which we owe to Him. He is our 
Maker. He created us. He made the body of 
our forefather out of the dust of the ground and 
breathed into him the breath of life, so that he 
became a living soul, and each descendant since 
that time has come into being under a law which 
God ordained. 

He is our Preserver. It is by His sustaining 
power that we live each day and each hour, for 
" in Him we live and move and have our being." 
He is our Redeemer. We were guilty and lost 
but He loved us and sent His Son to save us. 
And the Son gave Himself for us that He might 
bring us back to God and heaven. 

He is to be our Judge. " God hath appointed 
a day in the which He will judge the world in 
righteousness by that man whom He hath or- 
dained." " For we must all appear before the 
judgment seat of Christ that every one may re- 
ceive the things done in the body, according to 
that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." 
(II Corinthians 5:10.) 



GOD 71 

He is our Advocate. He has undertaken to 
plead our cause in the judgment of the great day. 
He will plead not what we are or have done, but 
His own perfect obedience, His own suffering and 
death and His own perfect righteousness. 

He is our King. He is infinitely worthy. He 
is all-powerful and He must reign till all enemies 
be put under His feet. 

Out of these relations spring important duties 
which we owe to God. If He made, preserves and 
redeems us, we should reverence, love, worship and 
serve Him. " Ye are not your own. Ye are 
bought with a price — wherefore glorify Him in 
your bodies and spirits which are His." If He is 
to be our Judge we should prepare for the ac- 
count which we must render at His bar. If, in 
Jesus Christ, he offers to be our Advocate we 
should place our cause in His hands that He may 
plead for us in that great day. If He be our 
King we should be loyal to Him and do all we can 
to extend the borders of His kingdom. If He be 
our God we should give Him the love of our 
hearts, the praise of our lips, the worship of our 
souls and the service of our lives. 



CHAPTER VI 
CREATION 

Men, in all ages, have sought to know the origin 
of the universe. Some have concluded that it is 
eternal; others that it came by chance, and still 
others that it was evolved under the operation 
of natural law. That which men have thus vainly 
guessed God has clearly revealed in His Word. 
The Bible is the only book that gives a satisfac- 
tory account of the origin of the world and of the 
human race. 

The first verse of Genesis teaches us more on 
this subject than all other books. It tells us who 
the Creator is, what He created, when He created 
and how. 

Who? "God created." It was Jehovah, the 
infinitely wise and powerful and good, who created 
all things. They had not always existed, they 
did not come by chance and they were not evolved 
by natural law, but they were created and made 
by the power of God. The word, bar a, here 
translated create, is the strongest word the He- 
brews had for expressing the idea of an immediate 
creation out of nothing. It is true that later it 

was used in a secondary sense of " to form " out 

72 






CREATION 73 

of preexisting material, but it is also true that 
when they would express the idea of making some- 
thing out of nothing, this is the word in their 
language most appropriate for such expression. 
If the idea could not be conveyed by this word, 
then there was no other by which the thought 
could be expressed. It is plain that the word 
is here used to express the idea of an absolute 
creation of something out of nothing, because no 
mention had been made of preexisting material, 
because it is declared that " in the beginning," 
that is, originally, when things began to be, God 
created them, and because in the subsequent verses, 
when the inspired writer comes to describe the 
process by which God formed the material which 
He had created into beings and objects of beauty, 
he uses the word, as ah, which uniformly means to 
form or fashion that which had already been cre- 
ated. Having informed us, in the first verse, how 
the material heavens and earth came into exist- 
ence by the creative fiat of the Almighty, the 
writer proceeds to inform us how the matter thus 
made was brought into forms of beauty and use 
by the skill and power of God, the Maker of all 
things. As Dr. Dick has well said, " The mani- 
fest design here is to inform us by what steps God 
brought the rude mass of material into that beau- 
tiful assemblage of parts which excites the won- 
der and admiration of every beholder." The 
original production of matter out of nothing is 
set forth first, and then the bringing of that mat- 



74 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ter into proper form is revealed to us. There are 
other passages which confirm this interpretation 
and throw light upon it. In the 17th of John 
and 5th verse, Christ refers to the glory which He 
had with the Father " before the world was," and 
of a love wherewith the Father loved Him " before 
the foundation of the world." Then in the elev- 
enth chapter of Hebrews and third verse we read, 
" Through faith we understand that the worlds 
were framed by the word of God; so that things 
which are seen were not made of things which do 
appear." Here we are expressly taught that God 
used no material in His original creation, that He 
did not make the things which are now seen out 
of things which were apparent, but that He made 
the heavens and the earth out of nothing. 

What God made? In answer to this question 
it is elsewhere written, " All things were made by 
Him and without Him was not anything made 
which was made." (John 1:3.) Here in Gene- 
sis it is said, " God created the heavens and the 
earth." These two expressions were intended to 
represent to men all things, or at least all of the 
material out of which all things were subsequently 
made. " The earth " which was to be the habita- 
tion of man God made, and the heavens which 
were stretched above the earth God made also. 
All things that man could see upon the face of the 
earth or behold in the heavens above came directly 
from God the Creator. The material He created 
directly and immediately by the word of His 



CREATION 75 

power. Then He fashioned this material into 
such forms of beauty and order as seemed to Him 
wisest and best. 

In the heavens He placed the clouds and the sky 
and above these the sun, moon and stars. 

In the air He made to fly every bird and winged 
fowl. In the sea He made and placed fish and 
everything, both small and great, that swims in 
the water. 

On the land He made the grass, the herb, the 
flower and the trees. In the forests and in the 
fields He made the beasts and the creeping things, 
both small and great. Having provided for man 
a home of beauty and delight, and having created 
all things to serve his wants and to please his 
tastes, He made man in His own image and after 
His own likeness and gave him dominion over all 
else He had made on the earth. 

Thus God proceeded in regular and beautiful 
order in His work. He first created the material 
and then on the first day of His bringing order 
out of confusion and chaos, He made the light. 
On the second day He made the firmament, includ- 
ing the atmosphere and the clouds. On the third 
day He divided the sea from the land and caused 
the grass and herbs and trees to grow. 

On the fourth day He made the sun and moon 
and stars. On the fifth day He made the fish 
of the sea and the fowl of the air. 

On the sixth day He made the cattle, and creep- 
ing things and beasts of the forests. Then, last 



76 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

of all, He made man, the last and highest work of 
His creation. 

Then, having completed His work, God rested 
on the seventh day from all the work which He 
had done, " wherefore the Lord blessed the Sab- 
bath day and hallowed it." The time when this 
creation took place was " in the beginning," that 
is, at the very commencement of time. Not from 
eternity did matter exist, but was created in the 
beginning of time. It was then that God made the 
heavens and the earth. As to when that was no 
man can tell with any degree of certainty, for 
man was not then made and God has not revealed 
the time. The period between the time when God 
made the material and the time when He fashioned 
it for a habitation of man may have been a very 
long or only a short one, for " one day with the 
Lord is as a thousand years and a thousand years 
are as one day." (II Peter 3:8.) 

As to the time since man was created the Bible 
does not speak with definiteness. The best inter- 
preters, comparing Scripture with Scripture, place 
that time at about six thousand years ago. The 
fact that credible history does not reach back of 
that period would seem to indicate that it was not 
before that time. " The silence of history with 
respect to any event prior to that time seems to 
teach that the race did not exist before the time 
indicated by the Mosaic record. If the world and 
the human race had existed for millions of years 
before that, how does it happen that not a hint 



CREATION 77 

has come down to us of the innumerable former 
generations? How is it that civilization can be 
traced back only to a period which is but as yes- 
terday, if the earth and its inhabitants had no be- 
ginning? The want of all records of a higher 
date, the recent origin of nations and the late 
invention of arts all concur to show that only a 
few thousand years have passed since our race 
came into existence." The poet Lucretius uses 
this argument for the recent rise of the human 
race : " Why, beyond the Theban war and the 
sack of Troy, were there not other poets to cele- 
brate other deeds." 

Why does history begin with facts and events 
of comparatively recent date if the race has lived 
and wrought for so many thousand of years longer 
than is understood from the Bible? The recent 
discoveries in the East all tend to confirm the 
teaching of the Bible concerning the age of na- 
tions and of the earth in its present form. 

When we raise the question as to How the 
heavens and the earth were created the answer is 
threefold: By the word of His power, out of 
nothing and very good. He did not have to do 
as man must when he makes anything, use material 
already furnished, but He spake the word and 
called things into existence by the word of His 
power. He created out of nothing the material 
and then formed it into the shapes and objects He 
had planned. Each thing that He made corre- 
sponded exactly to the thought that lay in His 



78 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

mind, so that " God saw every thing that He had 
made, and behold it was very good." Everything 
was made according to plan and for a specific pur- 
pose, so that when made it was good and useful 
in its place and order. He made things that were 
beautiful and things that were useful. He gave 
to each a nature and a capacity suited to the pur- 
pose for which it was made. He had a thought 
for each and every thing which He made. When 
He made the members of the mineral kingdom He 
gave them solid substance and beautiful and regu- 
lar form. To the members of the vegetable king- 
dom He gave not only substance and form but, in 
addition, the mysterious principle of life, show- 
ing that He had a thought concerning this de- 
partment of His creation which He did not have 
concerning that which was lower. To the animals 
He gave substance and form and life and in addi- 
tion instinct. To man, who was to be His repre- 
sentative on earth, He gave not only substance 
and form and life and instinct but an immortal 
soul, capable of knowing and loving His great and 
holy character and of doing His holy will. He 
made man in His own image and after His own 
likeness, with a spirit like His own, with mind to 
know the truth, with heart to love the good, with 
conscience to approve the right and with will to 
obey his God. He made him like Himself, in 
knowledge, righteousness and true holiness, with 
dominion over all of the creatures of His hand. 
He made him a personal, rational free agent with 



CREATION 79 

power to choose and do good or evil. He sur- 
rounded him with everything best suited to pro- 
mote his welfare and happiness. He placed him 
in a beautiful garden to dress and keep it. He 
gave him a companion of his own flesh and blood 
that she might be as near and dear to him as his 
own person. He gave him light to please the eye 
and guide him in the wa}^ air for his lungs, food 
for his body, truth for his mind, love for his heart, 
authority for his will and law for his conscience, 
and then crowned him as king and ruler over the 
fish of the sea, the birds of the air and the beasts 
of the field and gave him the earth for his inherit- 
ance so long as he remained true and loyal to his 
Maker. Moreover, God agreed with man, upon 
condition of perfect obedience for a limited time 
to confirm him in a state of holiness and to give 
to him and to all of his posterity the blessings of 
life eternal, but warned him that if he disobeyed 
he would secure for himself and for all of his de- 
scendants death eternal. Surely man thus en- 
dowed, thus surrounded and thus forewarned, must 
have felt that he and his condition were " very 
good." As he looked up into the heavens he could 
exclaim, " The heavens declare the glory of God 
and the firmament sheweth forth His handy work. 
Day unto day uttereth speech and night unto 
night sheweth knowledge " ; and as he meditated 
upon God's mindfulness of him could say, " How 
precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God. How 
great is the sum of them. They cannot be reck- 



80 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

oned up in order before thee. If I would declare 
and speak of them they are more than can be 
numbered." 

What practical lessons can we learn from this 
great fundamental teaching of God concerning 
creation ? 

First, a lesson of the infinite wisdom and power 
of the God whom we worship. His plan was 
formed from all eternity. He began to reveal 
that plan when He began His work of creation. 
Everything He made revealed some thought that 
lay in His great mind. To form such a plan be- 
spoke His infinite wisdom, but to carry it out in 
the creation of the heavens and the earth made 
known more clearly His power and skill as the 
great Architect. That man who can form a wise 
plan evinces his wisdom, but he who not only 
makes a wise plan but puts it into execution shows 
yet more clearly his wisdom. God has made known 
His wisdom and power not only in the plan of crea- 
tion but in the wonderful skill with which He hath 
put that plan into execution. The wisest philoso- 
pher and the mightiest king on earth could not, 
with their combined wisdom and wealth and power, 
make a single plant or flower, but our God has 
created the heavens and the earth and has filled 
them with thousands of stars and millions of trees 
and shrubs and flowers. Nothing but infinite wis- 
dom and power could have built the universe, 
created its countless inhabitants and provided for 
their wants. 



CREATION 81 

Let us learn, next, a lesson of the infinite good- 
ness of God. This goodness manifests itself in 
constitutions with which He has endowed His crea- 
tures and the provision He has made for their 
wants. As the Psalmist meditated upon this sub- 
ject he said, " He openeth His hand and satisfieth 
the desire of every living thing. He giveth them 
their meat in season," and Christ taught that the 
heavenly Father " notes the fall of the sparrow 
and heareth the young ravens when they cry." 
Of man it is said that He careth for him and in- 
vites him to cast his burden on Him and promises 
to sustain him and He pledges to guide him even 
unto death and afterward to receive him into 
glory. The earth is full of the goodness of the 
Lord. " Like as a father pitieth his children so 
the Lord pitieth them that fear Him." 

Let us learn also a lesson of dependence on 
God. If He gave us life and all of its blessings 
He can withdraw these at any time. We are in- 
debted to Him for life and health and home and 
kindred and friends and neighbors and for all of 
the blessings of this life and for all of the hopes of 
the life to come. Let us never forget, then, that 
we are creatures of His hand, dependent upon 
Him for life and for every blessing of life. Let 
us learn a lesson of gratitude. If He has given 
us being and surrounded us with so many bless- 
ings it is our duty to feel and express our grati- 
tude to Him, the author of all good. His good- 
ness should call forth our love and bind us to Him 



82 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

in loyal, loving service. We should say with 
David, " What shall I render unto the Lord for 
all of His benefits to me? I will take the cup of 
salvation and call upon the name of the Lord." 
Let us give Him the gratitude of our hearts, the 
praise of our lips and the service of our lives. 



CHAPTER VII 
ANGELS 

There are many reasons why we should feel a 
deep interest in angels. 

They were created by the same God who made 
us; they were present and rejoiced when man was 
created ; they announced the birth of our Savior 
and they are made glad by the repentance of each 
sinner. Some of them, like ourselves, have fallen 
under the influence of sin and some of them have 
been confirmed in holiness, as some of us hope to 
be. Good angels are the messengers of God, sent 
forth to seek the salvation of men ; while bad an- 
gels are messengers of Satan, sent forth to seek 
the ruin of men. At the last holy angels will come 
to conduct the redeemed to the world of light 
and then join with them in the worship and service 
of the Lord God who made them both. Sinful 
angels will then come to lead the lost down to the 
realms of darkness and then join with them in 
their suffering and cursing and anguish. Our 
weal and woe are so involved in that of the angels 
that we should desire to know all we can of them. 

Who, then, are the angels? What their na- 
ture? their number? their classes? their employ- 
ments and their destiny? 

83 



84 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

The word from which the term angel comes 
means a messenger, whether from God or man, 
whether human or spiritual. In this study it 
stands for a spiritual messenger from the other 
world. As there were Sadducees of old who denied 
the existence of angels so, in modern times, there 
are rationalists who tell us there are no angels. 
But both reason and revelation teach us to believe 
that there are spiritual beings in a grade higher 
than man. Below man we find a gradation of liv- 
ing beings extending from man down to the very 
lowest form of life. So we might, reasonably, ex- 
pect to find rising above man a series of living 
creatures, reaching up to God, the supreme Being, 
the Creator and Maker of all things. The Bible 
is clear in its teaching concerning a class of beings 
above man and yet below God. These are spirit- 
ual, immaterial beings whom He calls angels be- 
cause He uses them as His messengers in the revela- 
tion of His will and in the execution of His pur- 
poses. It was with reference to these that He 
spake when He said, " Thou madest him a little 
lower than the angels," and " unto the angels hath 
He not put in subjection the world to come, 
whereof we speak." Among these angels there 
seem to be grades or orders, as indicated in the ex- 
pressions, " thrones, dominions, principalities and 
powers." We read also of cherubim, seraphim 
and of angels and the arch-angel, " the chief of 
the princes of the angels." We are not told the 
ground nor the nature of these distinctions of the 



ANGELS 85 

one class from the other, but the use of such terms 
plainly indicates that there is a gradation in rank 
among the angels. We are taught, however, that 
whatever be the rank of angelic beings, however 
high or low, they were all created by the same Al- 
mighty power. " For by Him were all things 
created that are in heaven and that are in earth," 
(Colossians 1 : 16) and, " All things were made by 
Him and without Him was not any thing made 
that was made." (John 1:13.) And because 
they were created and owe their love and adora- 
tion to their infinite King and Creator, " when 
He bringeth His first begotten into the world He 
saith, Let all of the angels of God worship Him." 

As to when the angels were created we are not 
informed except that, since they are represented 
as being present and rejoicing at the creation of 
man, they must have been created some time be- 
fore man. 

Angels are spiritual beings, having no material 
bodies, but being pure spirits like God, the supreme 
Spirit, according to the Scripture, " Who maketh 
His angels spirits." (Hebrews 1:7.) 

They are real persons. All of the traits of 
personality are ascribed to them. They are sent, 
they come, they go, they speak, they desire, they 
know, they love, they rejoice, they worship, they 
adore and they serve. 

They are intelligent. They must be intelligent 
in order to deliver His messages and execute His 
will when sent to instruct, guide, protect and de- 



86 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

liver His people from the malice of their enemies. 
The woman of Tokoa gave expression to the He- 
brew view of the superior knowledge of angels when 
she said, " My lord is wise according to the wis- 
dom of an angel, knowing all things that are on 
earth." While their knowledge can never equal 
that of God, they are doubtless far more intelli- 
gent than the wisest of men. They are more 
highly endowed ; they are holy so that their minds 
are unclouded by sin ; they dwell with God and can 
constantly learn from Him lessons of knowledge 
and wisdom. They have long enjoyed these privi- 
leges so that their accumulated store of learning 
must be far superior to that of man. As com- 
pared with angels, the wisest man is but a child 
in understanding. They possess great power and 
are exceedingly quick and active in their move- 
ments. They pass from place to place with the 
rapidity of light. When Daniel was praying at 
eventide God commanded His angel Gabriel to go 
down and speak to him. The angel went from 
heaven to Daniel and touched and spake to him 
while he was still at his evening devotions. In 
one night the angel of God destroyed 185,000 of 
the hosts of Assyrians. By the strength of an 
angel the stone was rolled from the Savior's tomb 
and by an angel Peter was delivered from prison. 
Hence they are called " mighty angels " and are 
said to excel in strength. (Matthew 6:53; 
Psalms 103:20.) 

They are holy. As they came from the hand 



ANGELS 87 

of God they must have been perfectly holy be- 
cause He, their Maker, is holy. Hence they are 
expressly called holy and the manner in which 
they obey the holy will of God in heaven is held 
up to us as an example and we are taught by the 
Savior to pray that God's " will may be done on 
earth as it is in heaven." And angels are repre- 
sented as saying in humble, adoring worship, 
" Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts ; the whole 
earth is full of thy glory." 

They are immortal, for our immortality is set 
forth by comparison with theirs when the Savior 
says, " Neither can they die any more for they 
are like to the angels." (Luke 20:30.) 

They are happy. This follows from the fact 
that they are holy, for only sin can cause sorrow. 
They have nothing to regret for the past and noth- 
ing to fear for the future. They dwell in an 
abode of happiness. They enjoy the favor of God 
and have the high privilege of His worship and 
service. 

The number of the angels is great beyond hu- 
man enumeration. The Psalmist (68: 17) speaks 
of " thousands of angels." A " multitude " of 
the heavenly hosts appeared to the shepherds when 
the Savior was born. Christ asserted His power 
to summon " twelve legions " of angels to His as- 
sistance when in danger at the hands of His ene- 
mies. John, in the isle of Patmos, heard the 
voices of " many angels, even ten thousand times 
ten thousand and thousands of thousands," and 



88 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews writes of 
" an innumerable company of angels." (Hebrews 
12:22.) Milton seems, therefore, to have good 
ground for saying : 

" Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 
Unseen, both while we wake and while we sleep." 

As to the employment of good angels, we are 
taught that they worship and serve God. They 
sing His praise before His throne in heaven and 
they are sent forth on missions of love and mercy 
and of wrath and justice, according to the will of 
their sovereign Lord and King. They are a 
" flame of fire " to the enemies of God but " minis- 
ters of salvation " to them who would come back 
to God and know and enjoy His presence and 
favor. 

They reveal the will of God. The law was given 
" under the ministration of angels," the Savior's 
birth was announced by an angel and the revela- 
tion which was given to John in Patmos was " sent 
and signified to him by His angel." 

They suggest good thoughts and feelings to the 
people of God. The wicked angels are represented 
as " working in the minds of the children of dis- 
obedience " ; so also may the good angels suggest 
that which is noble and good and pure to the minds 
and hearts of the children of obedience. 

They protect and defend the children of God. 
" He shall give His angels charge over thee," and 
" The angel of the Lord encampeth round about 



ANGELS 89 

them that fear Him." (Psalms 91 : 10 and 34 : 7.) 
They guide, comfort and strengthen believers. 
The angel guided the Church in the wilderness, 
strengthened Jesus in the garden, stood by Paul 
in the storm at sea and comforted the hearts of 
the women at the sepulcher. So now do they min- 
ister to those who are heirs of salvation. If the 
Church, and Jesus and Paul and the women of 
Christ's day needed and received the guiding, 
strengthening and encouraging ministrations of 
these heavenly messengers, God's children of this 
day need and may expect to receive their help as 
they journey from earth to heaven. As they bore 
the spirit of Lazarus to the mansions of rest in 
heaven, so will they conduct " the spirits of just 
men made perfect in holiness " to their home in 
heaven. 

While all angels were originally holy and good, 
yet certain of them, having been left to the free- 
dom of their own wills, fell into sin. They banded 
together against the God of heaven and thus lost 
their holiness and their abode in the holy and 
happy home in heaven and were thrust out into 
the outer darkness to pay the penalty of their sin. 
There they are said to be " reserved in chains of 
darkness unto the judgment." (II Peter %\ 4.) 

How a holy angel, with no outside tempter, 
could fall into sin no man can know, but of the 
fact there can be no doubt to the reverent student 
of the Word of God. We are expressly told that 
some of them " kept not their first estate." ( Jude 



90 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

5-6.) That estate was one of holiness and when 
they left that they entered into one of sin and 
misery. " The angels which kept not their first 
estate, but left their own habitation, He hath re- 
served in everlasting chains under darkness unto 
the judgment of the great day." 

What the particular sin was into which the an- 
gels first fell we do not know unless we have a hint 
as to its nature in that passage in I Timothy 3 : 6, 
in which it is written, " Not a novice lest being 
lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation 
of the devil." Some have concluded from this 
that pride was what led to the condemnation of 
the devil. That he was lifted up with pride be- 
cause of his greatness and glory, his exalted rank 
and position of prominence among his fellow an- 
gels. That dwelling upon this and thinking of 
his eminence, his knowledge and his power, he be- 
came vain in his estimate of himself and ceased 
to be sufficiently humble in the sight of God who 
made him and so dared to oppose his Maker. 
However this may be, we know, upon the testi- 
mony of God, that he and many of his companions 
sinned against God and lost their holiness and 
their home in heaven. 

They were still creatures of God's hand but 
they had lost His image. They were still spirit- 
ual beings but had ceased to be holy spirits. 
They still possessed great intelligence and 
strength but they no longer used these in the 
service of God but of Satan, their chief and leader. 



ANGELS 91 

They were still immortal, but theirs was now an 
immortality of sinfulness and of misery and not 
one of holiness and happiness. The great, radical 
change wrought by their fall was in their moral 
natures. From being holy they became unholy. 
From being loyal and loving subjects of Jehovah 
they became traitors against His cause and rebels 
against His authority. From having the guid- 
ance and blessing of His Spirit they became des- 
titute of His presence and blessing. Instead of 
continuing in the service of God their King they 
now enlisted in the service of the wicked angel 
who had led them astray. Thenceforth they be- 
came members of the kingdom of darkness and 
did everything in their power against the kingdom 
of light. 

Not only did they manifest their enmity against 
God and His kingdom, but they began an inces- 
sant war against man. Their leader deceived Eve 
and drew Adam away from his loyalty to God and 
sought to lead the whole race down to the regions 
of the lost. He still " goeth about as a roaring 
lion seeking whom he may devour." His demons 
are equally active in their efforts to work the ruin 
of man. Such is their activity and power that 
the inspired writer says, " We wrestle not against 
flesh and blood but against principalities, against 
powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this 
world, against spiritual wickedness in high 
places." (Ephesians 6:1.) Bad angels, under 
the name of Satan and his demons, have power 



92 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

to injure the body. The devil destroyed Job's 
property and afflicted his body with a loathsome 
disease. Demons entered the bodies of men, in 
the Savior's time, and usurped authority over both 
body and mind. So might they do today if God 
should permit. 

But the greatest evil Satan and his allies can 
do to man is to tempt him to sin. He knows that 
" when sin is finished it bringeth forth death," 
and hence he seeks to lead men into sin that he 
may secure their spiritual and everlasting death. 
He is a murderer and nothing short of the death 
of his victim will satisfy him. He tempted Eve. 
He tempted Job and David and Solomon. He 
tempted Jesus Himself. He tempted Peter to 
deny his Lord and sought to have him that he 
might destroy him, but the Savior prayed for him 
that his faith might not fail. If he tempted all 
of these he will tempt you and me. If he sought 
their ruin he will seek ours. The destiny of the 
angels who remained faithful to God is everlast- 
ing life, for God expressly teaches that they shall 
" die no more." They have been confirmed in 
holiness and shall be kept by the power of God 
forever and ever. The evil angels for their wilful 
and daring sins have been assigned their place in 
" the everlasting chains under darkness unto the 
judgment of the great day." 

How grateful should we be for the ministration 
of good angels ! They protect us in danger, 
strengthen us in weakness, guard us in tempta- 



ANGELS 93 

tion, comfort us in sorrow, support us in death 
and welcome us to heaven. 

How we should be on our guard against evil 
angels! They may injure our bodies, derange 
our minds and ruin our souls. They may tempt 
us to sin and lead us down to death. 

Let us seek the help and protection of Him who 
hath vanquished Satan and all of his hosts and 
pledged and promised us victory over all of our 
spiritual foes. 



CHAPTER VIII 
PROVIDENCE 

The care and control which God exercises over 
the universe is called His providence. The word, 
providence, is from a root that means to see be- 
fore, then to know before and thence to provide 
beforehand. Thus we speak of a provident man 
— a man who sees before what is needed and se- 
cures it. So God, in an infinite and perfect man- 
ner, sees beforehand and provides that which is 
necessary for the execution of all of His holy 
will. Providence indeed is but the unfolding and 
outworking in time of His eternal purpose and 
plan. It includes both the preservation and the 
government of all that He hath created. 
Granted His power to create all things, it follows 
as a matter of course that He is able to preserve 
and control every creature of His hand. Still, as 
His providence has been denied by some and not 
so fully recognized as it should be by others, it 
will be well to review some of the evidences of that 
providence over our world. 

His perfections are such as to qualify Him for 

keeping and directing everything which He hath 

made. 

94, 



PROVIDENCE 95 

His infinite knowledge enables Him to under- 
stand the nature and know the wants of every 
creature from the smallest to the greatest. His 
infinite power and resources are such as to enable 
Him to uphold all things and to meet and sup- 
ply the want of each and every living thing which 
He hath made. His boundless wisdom qualifies 
Him to make the best possible use of that which 
His knowledge reveals and that which His power 
supplies. No emergency can possibly arise for 
which His wisdom and power are not equal. He 
can and will do all of His holy will concerning 
each and every created being. Then His good- 
ness will prompt Him to bestow well-being and 
happiness upon all of His creatures so far as He 
can do so without disregard to His other glorious 
attributes, and His justice will insure a righteous 
and holy rule over all who are subject to His au- 
thority. 

How unreasonable to suppose that such a being 
would exert His powers to bring into existence a 
countless throng of living beings and then forsake 
them and cease to preserve and govern them ! It 
would be to forsake the work of His own hands. 
It would be for a father to cease to care for his 
own children. 

The helplessness of all created things is such as 
to demand and require the sustaining power of 
some great and good being such as the God re- 
vealed to us in nature and in the Bible. If God 
did not, by His mighty power and wisdom, sustain 



96 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

and direct the movement of the heavenly bodies 
endless confusion and certain destruction would 
be the inevitable result. " The heavens declare 
the glory of God and the firmament showeth forth 
His handiwork." 

If God did not send the early and the latter 
rain upon the earth, all vegetation would wither 
and die and men and beasts would die for lack of 
food. " He causeth the grass to grow for the 
cattle, and herb for the service of man; that He 
may bring forth food out of the earth. These all 
wait upon thee ; that thou mayest give them their 
meat in due season." (Psalms 104 : 14, 9X.) " He 
openeth His hand and satisfieth the desire of every 
living thing." (Psalms 145:16.) Man, though 
created superior to all earthly beings, is still de- 
pendent upon God his Maker. How ignorant of 
his own highest good is the wisest man ! Even 
Solomon confessed that he was but as a little child 
and prayed to God for wisdom and guidance. 

How weak is man in the face of the enemies 
which surround him! He cannot keep himself 
alive nor can he walk in the way that leadeth unto 
eternal life except as aided and guided by divine 
wisdom and power. Then, too, he is guilty and 
condemned under a just and holy law and cannot 
keep that law nor pay the penalty due to sin with- 
out giving up all hope of heaven. He is lost and 
cannot save himself. He needs God to keep and 
guide and save him. Now if, on the one hand, 
God be able to keep and govern all His creatures, 



PROVIDENCE 97 

and they all need such preservation and control, 
what more natural than that God should extend 
such help to them? 

The beautiful order which we observe in nature 
is an evidence of an overruling providence. The 
student of nature not only traces evidences of de- 
sign in the original constitution of the heavens 
and the earth but also in their continued exist- 
ence. The regular rotation of the earth upon its 
axis, giving us day and night; the revolution of 
the earth around the sun, giving us the change of 
seasons; the return of seed time and harvest; the 
production of seed after his kind ; the preservation 
of the proper proportion of the sexes ; the preser- 
vation and increase of the race and the spread of 
mankind over the earth — these and many other 
facts are clear evidences of the presence and power 
of God in the government of the world and its in- 
habitants. If it be said that all these things are 
the result of law, the answer is that these very 
laws are the best evidences of the Lawgiver. 
They are just His regular ways of doing things. 
Back of these laws and over these events standeth 
God, preserving and governing all creatures in all 
of their ways. 

The moral nature of man demands such a provi- 
dence. Men always and everywhere have such a 
sense of the presence of God and of their accounta- 
bility to Him that they show plainly that they 
hold and believe that God is not afar off, but that 
He is near them, that He is their Ruler and their 



98 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Judge and that to Him they must at last render an 
account of all of the deeds done in the body. 
Their consciences accuse them or excuse them, 
according as they do or fail to do that which is 
right. If they will but listen to the voice of con- 
science they may hear the voice of God speaking 
to them of right and wrong, of justice and retri- 
bution. Their fears, their prayers, their sacri- 
fices and their offerings all show that they have a 
sense of the presence and authority of God over 
their lives and conduct. How is this to be ac- 
counted for except upon the superstition that God 
hath revealed the fact of His rule to them and that 
He actually exercises over them such a providence 
as His character and their needs would lead us to 
expect ? 

If there should remain any doubt as to the 
providence of God over all things, that doubt will 
be dissipated by the Word of God from the minds 
of all those who receive this Word as a revelation 
from God. Listen to the emphatic language of 
the prophet Daniel (4:35), "He doeth according 
to His will in the army of heaven, and among the 
inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay His 
hand, or say unto Him, What doest thou ? " 
Read the words of the 139th Psalm, 1-10 : " O 
Lord thou hast searched me and known me. Thou 
knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou 
understandeth my thought afar off. Thou com- 
passeth my path and my lying down and art ac- 
quainted with all my ways. For there is not a 



PROVIDENCE 99 

word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest 
it altogether. Thou hast beset me behind and be- 
fore, and laid thine hand upon me. Such knowl- 
edge is too wonderful for me ; it is high, I cannot 
attain unto it. Whither shall I go from thy 
spirit? for whither shall I flee from thy presence? 
If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there ; if I 
make my bed in hell, behold thou art there. If I 
take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the ut- 
termost parts of the sea: Even there shall thy 
hand lead me and thy right hand shall hold me." 
Listen to Paul as he says, " In Him we live and 
move and have our being." (Acts 17: 28.) Hear 
the Savior Himself teach that not a sparrow fall- 
eth to the ground without the knowledge of His 
Father and that the very hairs of our heads are all 
numbered. Reflect how we are taught that the 
most uncertain things of this world are within the 
knowledge and under the control of God, as : The 
dice when the lot is cast, for it is written, " The 
lot is cast in the lap; but the whole disposing 
thereof is of the Lord." (Proverbs 16: 33) ; the 
way of man, while left with perfect freedom to do 
as he pleases — " the steps of the good man are 
ordered by the Lord." (Psalms 37:23); the 
ways of wicked men are overruled for the glory of 
God and for the welfare of His cause, as in the 
case of the brethren of Joseph when they sold him 
into bondage, intending it for evil, but God over- 
ruled it for good ; and in the case of Judas when he 
sold his Lord for thirty pieces of silver, intending 



100 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

it for evil, but God brought out of it the greatest 
good, " Him being delivered by the determinate 
counsel and foreknowledge of God ye have taken 
and with wicked hands have crucified and slain. 
Whom God hath raised from the dead " (Acts 
£: 23) and " Him hath God exalted to be a prince 
and a savior, for to give repentance unto Israel 
and forgiveness of sins." (Acts 5:31.) 

The properties of that providence which God 
exercises over the world correspond to the attri- 
butes of His own perfect nature. 

It is perfectly holy. As God is holy so must 
be all of the outworkings of His holy plan. 
Though He permits He does not endorse the evil 
acts of man, nor is He in any sense responsible for 
them. He made man upright and surrounded him 
with the most favorable circumstances and then 
left him to the freedom of his own will. It is man 
who hath sought out many inventions. It is man 
who hath turned his back on God his Maker and 
gone off into the ways of sin and death. It is 
man who hath made alliance with sin and with 
Satan. God expressly disclaims all responsi- 
bility for man's sin and man is conscious of the 
fact that when he sins he does so of his own ac- 
cord, freely and without any constraint or com- 
pulsion from God. Hence it is written : " Let 
no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of 
God: for God cannot be tempted with evil neither 
tempteth He any man ; But every man is tempted, 
when he is drawn away of his own lust, and en- 



PROVIDENCE 101 

ticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth 
forth sin : and sin when it is finished bringeth forth 
death." (James 1:13-15.) 

This providence is a wise exercise of power and 
holiness, justice, goodness and mercy. This wis- 
dom is shown in nature by the wonderful provision 
for the wants of all creatures. The necessities of 
every creature, from the smallest insect to the 
largest animal, from the dumb brute to the being 
created in the image of God, are all provided for 
with unstinted bounty. God opens His hand and 
supplieth the wants of every living thing. It is 
shown in the history of the rise and fall of nations 
and peoples. All those nations which set them- 
selves in opposition to the kingdom of Christ have 
been broken and brought to desolation in the past 
and such must be the fate of all who oppose the 
reign of King Immanuel in the future. 

It is shown in the preservation of the Jewish 
people and in the spread of Christianity. It is 
shown in the plan of redeeming love and in the 
manner in which men are called into the kingdom 
of God. 

This providence is not only wise and holy but 
it is powerful. Witness that power as it was dis- 
played in the deliverance of the children of Israel 
from the land of bondage, in their passage through 
the sea, in their being fed in the wilderness and in 
their being brought at last into the land of prom- 
ise. 

Witness that power as it was displayed in the 



102 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

rise and spread of Christianity in the early ages 
when the combined forces of the world sought to 
stamp it out, when through ten bloody persecu- 
tions the blood of the martyrs became the seed of 
the Church, and when they that were scattered 
abroad by persecution went everywhere preaching 
the gospel. 

Witness that power as displayed in the Reform- 
ation of the sixteenth century when under the 
preaching of a few men such a great revolution 
was brought about both in church and state. 

Witness that power as revealed in the marvel- 
ous success of modern missions among the nations 
of the earth. And witness that power in the 
gospel wherever it is preached and received and 
see how it becomes " the power of God unto salva- 
tion unto every one that believeth." 

It is universal in its sway. It is His most holy, 
wise and powerful preserving and governing all of 
His creatures in all of their ways. It is not only 
a general but a special providence which God exer- 
cises over His creatures. No creature, however 
small, gets beyond the providence of God. None, 
however great, is beyond His control. None, how- 
ever good, ceases to need His help and none, how- 
ever wicked, can escape His power. " Surely the 
wrath of man shall praise thee; the remainder of 
wrath shalt thou restrain." (Psalms 76:10.) 
As to the manner in which God exercises His provi- 
dence over the world we know little. Of the fact 
there can be no doubt, but as to how that fact is 






PROVIDENCE 103 

made real we cannot fully know. God expressly 
says, " What I do thou knowest not now but thou 
shalt know hereafter." Of two things we may be 
perfectly certain. First, that God will exercise 
His providence in such a way as not to do violence 
to His own nature and attributes. He will not 
tarnish His holy name by becoming in the slight- 
est degree responsible for man's sin. He will not 
act unwisely. He will show no sign of weakness. 
He will do no injustice. He will exempt none from 
the sway of His power. He will in all things and 
at all times be true to Himself. 

Next, He will exercise His providence in such a 
way as not to violate the nature of the creature. 
He will deal with the material world in accordance 
with the laws with which He endowed that part of 
His creation. He will deal with the animal king- 
dom in perfect harmony with the laws which He 
hath ordained for the members of that kingdom 
and He will treat man in accordance with the laws 
which He hath imbedded in His very nature. He 
will never forget that man has a mind to receive 
the truth, a heart to love the good and a will to 
regulate his conduct, a conscience to respond to 
the call of duty and a soul free from all external 
compulsion. God will never violate the nature of 
man, though He may enlighten his mind, renew his 
heart, strengthen his will, awaken his conscience 
and change the dispositions of his soul. In doing 
so God will not only not destroy the free agency 
of man, but will the rather establish it by deliver- 



104 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ing him from the blindness and hardness of sin and 
by releasing his soul from bondage to sin and Satan 
and translating man into the glorious light and 
liberty of the sons of God. To restore to man's 
soul the divine likeness and to beget within his soul 
right and holy dispositions and thus insure right 
choosing and holy living, so far from taking away 
from man anything of his original nature, is but 
the restoring to man that which he has lost 
through yielding to sin and to the suggestions of 
Satan. 

There are many important lessons to be learned 
from the study of God's providence. It will re- 
mind us of our dependence upon God. If He 
sustains us in life each moment we live; if we live 
just as long and no longer than He decides; if we 
must look to Him for all of our blessings, if we 
are accountable unto Him for all of our actions 
and indebted to Him for all of our mercies, then 
how great is God and how weak and dependent are 
we! 

How secure are we if God be our God to watch 
over, guide, guard and protect us. " If God be 
for us who can be against us ? " We shall be 
" kept by the power of God through faith unto sal- 
vation ready to be revealed at the last day." 

How sure and certain the ultimate triumph of 
the cause of right ! Though the wrong may seem 
to hold sway for a time, and though many fall in 
the contest for the supremacy of the right, let all 
who put their trust in God rest assured that at last 



PROVIDENCE 105 

the victory shall be to the cause of righteousness 
because it is the cause of God. He will overturn 
and overturn till He whose right it is to reign shall 
reign King of kings and Lord of lords. Let us 
hear His voice speaking unto us and saying, " Be 
of good courage, I have overcome the world." 
" Fear not little flock, it is your Father's good 
pleasure to give you the kingdom." 



CHAPTER IX 
SIN 

Dr. Plumer once said, " Tell me what you think 
of sin and I will tell you what you think of God, 
Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Law, the Gospel and 
of every necessary truth of religion." 

Our view of sin will certainly influence and de- 
termine our view of the holiness of God, the maj- 
esty of His law and the value of His salvation. If 
we have low and unscriptural views of sin we will 
have correspondingly low and imperfect views of 
the character of God, the perfection of the law 
and the necessity of redemption. He who thinks 
lightly of his sin will treat the Savior and His 
salvation lightly. " He who sees no sin in himself 
will feel no need of a Savior." On the other hand 
if we have correct and scriptural ideas of sin we 
are likely to have correct ideas as to God, His law 
and its penalty and of pardon and deliverance 
from sin through the provision of the Gospel. 
There are not wanting evidences that in our day 
many have no adequate idea of the nature and evil 
of sin. The plain and explicit command of God is 
set aside in the interest of recreation and business. 

The day of God is spent in worldly amusements 

106 



SIN 107 

and employments. His worship is neglected, his 
name profaned and his law violated. There is an 
absence of that deep contribution for sin which 
characterized those who sought an interest in sal- 
vation in former days. There was a time when 
men, under conviction for sin, gave signs of the 
deepest distress. They wept and prayed and con- 
fessed and cried mightily unto God for pardon. 
That day has to a great extent passed away. 
Many now come into the Church with scarcely a 
sign of sorrow for sin. In rationalistic circles and 
among some who claim to worship God there is a 
disposition to discard altogether the thought that 
we inherit guilt and a sinful nature from Adam. 
Then there is a lack of that humbling and abid- 
ing sense of sin that once constituted a feature of 
the experience of those who sought to walk in the 
footsteps of Him who was " holy, harmless, unde- 
nted and separate from sinners." Some Chris- 
tians, overlooking the true nature of sin as that 
which colors and influences the thoughts, the de- 
sires and motives of the soul, claim that they are 
no longer sinful in the sight of the pure and holy 
God of heaven. 

How very important, therefore, to turn to the 
Word of God and learn afresh the true nature and 
influence of sin. There we learn that " by one 
man sin entered into the world and death by sin 
and so death passed upon all men for that all have 
sinned." What, then, is the true nature of sin? 
The Hebrew word for sin denotes a missing of the 



108 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

mark. The figure is taken from the practice of 
shooting at a mark. Instead of striking the cen- 
tre the arrow goes to the right or left, above or 
below. It misses the mark. God has placed be- 
fore man a high ideal of right and of destiny, but 
he misses that ideal by sinning against God. The 
Greek word which best describes sin is made up of 
two parts, alpha privative, which placed before a 
word changes it so as to express a negative instead 
of a positive meaning. It is placed before the 
word for law and in this combination the word 
means not according to law — unlawful, lawless- 
ness — everything not in harmony with the law is 
sin. This thought is carried out in the defini- 
tion with which some of you are familiar : " Sin is 
any want of conformity unto or transgression of 
the law of God." The want of conformity is " not 
being or doing what God requires." Transgres- 
sion is doing what God forbids. Sin is all discon- 
formity or nonconformity to the law of God. It 
includes all sins of omission as well as all acts of 
transgression. It embraces all wrong thoughts 
and feelings and desires as well as all wrong words 
and deeds. It includes the states of the heart and 
dispositions of the soul not according to the law 
of God as well as all of those outward actions not 
in harmony with that perfect standard of right. 
It includes the loss of the image of God in which 
man was originally created. As he came from the 
hand of God man reflected the divine image in 
knowledge, righteousness and true holiness. By 



SIN 109 

sin that image was lost, so that the mind became 
darkened, the righteousness perverted and the holi- 
ness lost. Nor is this all, for there was not only 
loss of original righteousness but the corruption of 
the whole nature. We are born not only destitute 
of the image of God, but in the image of sinful man. 
As a tiger begets a tiger and a wolf a wolf, so a 
sinner begets a son in his own sinful likeness. The 
deformity of sin extends to every power and fac- 
ulty of the soul. The mind is darkened, the heart 
is depraved and the will perverted. Then, too, 
there is the guilt of sin resting upon us from our 
birth, by which we are under obligation to be pun- 
ished. We are " by nature children of wrath even 
as others." We come unto the world not only sin- 
ful but condemned. 

Then from the evil within there flows out in our 
daily lives all of the acutal transgressions of which 
we become guilty. The bitter fountain sends forth 
bitter water. The bad tree bears evil fruit. Sin 
then includes the loss of God's holy image, the in- 
heritance of a sinful nature, the guilt of sin and all 
of the actual transgressions of our lives. Hence 
the heart of man is said to be " deceitful above all 
things and desperately wicked." When Job got a 
vision of the holy God and then turned his gaze 
upon his own sinful heart he said, " I abhor myself 
and repent in dust and ashes." When David 
searched his heart and reviewed his life he said, 
" Behold I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did 
my mother conceive me," and prayed to God, " Cre- 



110 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ate in me a clean heart O God, and renew a right 
spirit within me." Thus must we all feel and pray 
when we examine ourselves in the light of the Word 
and Spirit of God. Every man must say, " I have 
sinned," and everyone should pray, " God be merci- 
ful to me a sinner." 

Such is the lost, the helpless and the sinful con- 
dition of man — his ruin total and complete. By 
this we do not mean that man is as bad as he might 
be, because he is growing worse and worse every 
day. Nor do we mean that all men are equally 
bad because everyone can perceive degrees of sin in 
different men and the Bible teaches us that workers 
of iniquity " wax worse and worse." What we 
mean is that sin, in all men who have not been 
brought under the influence of grace, extends to the 
entire being and alienates the affections entirely 
from God, so that " the carnal mind is enmity 
against God ; for it is not subject to the law of God 
neither indeed can be." (Romans 8:7.) As the 
deadly loathsome, incurable leprosy taints the 
blood, and pervades and defiles every part and 
member of the body, so does sin affect and deprave 
every part of the soul of man. A small portion of 
poison thrown into a vessel of water poisons all 
of the water, though poison can be added till the 
entire body of water be poisoned to a greater de- 
gree. So sin in the soul of man reaches and af- 
fects every faculty of the mind and every disposi- 
tion of the heart and every movement of the will 
but as sin increases the darkness of the mind be- 



SIN 111 

comes more dense, the hardness of the heart more 
obdurate and the perversion of the will more com- 
plete. Man is represented as blind, in bondage, 
helpless, and as dead in trespasses and sins. God 
alone can raise him up, God alone can give the 
help that is needed. He alone can break the fet- 
ters of sin and He alone can open the blind eyes. 
Man, apart from God, is lost in sin totally, com- 
pletely, entirely lost. " Sin when it is finished 
bringeth forth death." 

We are taught that it was through one man that 
sin entered into the world. That man was Adam, 
who stood as our natural and federal head and 
represented our interests with God. To him was 
given a splendid opportunity to secure for himself 
and for all of his posterity a glorious and happy 
inheritance. He was a mature man with all the 
faculties necessary to constitute him a free, intelli- 
gent, moral and responsible agent — with power to 
obey or disobey the wise and holy commands of 
God his Father. He was placed in a holy and 
happy home, blessed with a holy companion, and 
surrounded with an abundance of all that could 
please the eye, gratify the taste and engage the 
thoughts of his mind, the affections of his heart 
and the energies of his will. Only one slight pro- 
hibition was placed upon him to test his love and 
loyalty. " Of the tree of the knowledge of good 
and evil thou shalt not eat of it ; for in the day thou 
eatest thereof thou shalt surely die ! " He was 
fully informed of the responsibility resting upon 



112 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

him and of the consequences of both obedience and 
disobedience. He was taught that whatever moral 
and legal status he should secure for himself he 
would secure for all of his posterity. If he obeyed 
he would be confirmed in holiness and innocence 
forever, and each and every one of his descendants 
would share with him all of the blessings and bene- 
fits of such confirmation. Like him they would be 
kept holy and happy to all eternity. Like him 
they would be permitted to dwell in the presence 
of God and so be secure against all of their ene- 
mies. By a short period of loving, loyal obedience 
he could secure for himself and for them a title to 
eternal life with all of its privileges and blessings. 

If he disobeyed he was to become guilty and de- 
praved, sinful and condemned — and so would all 
they who were to descend from him. By one short, 
sinful act of disobedience he would bring upon him- 
self and upon all of his descendants all of the evils 
included in the term death. " In the day thou eat- 
est thereof thou shalt surely die " was God's word 
of warning to Adam. " Ye shall not surely die " 
was the word of Satan. 

Eve, who had listened to the word of the tempter, 
gave to Adam of the fruit and, not deceived, but 
recreant to the high trust of his own and a race's 
eternal welfare he did eat of the forbidden fruit. 
In doing so he distrusted, disobeyed and dishon- 
ored God and thus brought himself and all man- 
kind into an estate of sin and misery. He became 
guilty and sinful and so all of his children became 



SIN 113 

guilty and sinful. Thus " by one man sin entered 
into the world and death passed upon all men." 
He stood as the head and representative of all 
mankind. He represented their cause. He held 
in his keeping their destiny. Just as they would 
all have been partakers of the blessings of eternal 
life had he maintained his innocence and loyalty, so 
now that he failed they became heirs of all the 
miseries of spiritual and eternal death. All men 
are involved in the ruin wrought by one man. 
They all inherit his nature and so share his guilt 
and condemnation. He begat sons and daughters 
in his own image and hence they all receive and suf- 
fer the penalty due to his sin and to theirs. Turn- 
ing to the Word of God we find the most explicit 
teaching as to the universal inheritance of sin on 
the part of all the sons and daughters of Adam. 
In I Kings 8 : 46, " There is no man that sinneth 
not." Psalms 143 : 2, " There is not a just man on 
the earth." I John, 1:8. " If we say we have 
no sin we deceive ourselves." I John 5 : 19. 
" The whole world lieth in iniquity." Romans, 
% : 23, " For all have sinned and come short of the 
glory of God." All persons, Jews, Gentiles — 
all ages, young and old — always and everywhere 
men sin and men die. 

The evil of sin may be measured by the dig- 
nity of the God against whom it is committed, by 
the ruin it brings upon man, by the evil it communi- 
cates to others and by the punishment God inflicts 
upon those who commit it and upon Him who un- 



114 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

dertook to pay its penalty in the sinner's stead. 
This penalty is here said to be death. " By one 
man sin entered into the world and death by sin 
and so death passed upon all men for that all have 
sinned." " The wages of sin is death." " Sin 
when it is finished bringeth forth death." Death is 
one of those comprehensive words that include sev- 
eral important elements. It means the loss of the 
grace of God from the soul, by which alone it is 
preserved in harmony with God. So long as that 
grace was there there was spiritual life and com- 
munion with God. They were at one in their 
views and purposes. They walked and talked to- 
gether, face to face, as man talks to his friend. 
But when grace was displaced by sin the soul lost 
its spiritual life. When grace was thrown out and 
sin was let in there entered sorrow and remorse. 
Discord reigned where once harmony had dwelt. 

Man became alienated from God, the source of 
life and light. It was in this sense that man suf- 
fered death, according to the threat of God in the 
day that he ate of the forbidden fruit. He ceased 
from that time to enjoy the presence and favor of 
God and became the object of His displeasure. 
Though God still pitied him and loved him with the 
love of compassion, He was bound by His holy 
nature to regard and treat him as a condemned 
sinner. He pronounced a curse upon him and 
drove him forth from the happy home in which He 
had placed him. Thus deprived of the grace of 
God and no longer enjoying His presence and help 



SIN 115 

and favor, man sank down into spiritual insensi- 
bility — he became dead in trespasses and sins. 
As a corpse is insensible of the light that shines 
upon it, so man in sin did not receive and use the 
spiritual light that shone upon him from heaven. 
" The light shineth in darkness and the darkness 
comprehendeth it not." As the dead man cares 
not for the feast that is spread out before him, so 
the sinner has no taste for the gospel feast spread 
out before him. Though the invitation goes forth, 
" Come, for all things are now ready," they " all 
with one consent began to make excuse." As the 
dead man has no power to raise himself up from 
physical death, so the sinner has no power to 
quicken himself into spiritual life. 

Another element of the penalty was a separa- 
tion of the soul from the body, or physical death, 
including all of the suffering, pain and disease lead- 
ing to and terminating in death of the body. All 
pain and sickness and sighing and death come from 
sin. Still another element of this death penalty is 
the separation of the sinner from the presence and 
favor of God forever. Though God has provided 
a means by which death can be conquered and man 
may be restored to spiritual and eternal life, many 
persistently reject this provision and so pass out 
into eternal death — ithe final separation from 
the presence and favor of God. This element will 
only be known when the final word of the Judge is 
spoken, " Depart from me ye cursed into everlast- 
ing fire prepared for the devil and his angels." 



116 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Then " these shall go away into the outer dark- 
ness where there shall be weeping and wailing and 
gnashing of teeth." Then shall be suffered the 
second death — the eternal death — threatened 
against sin. What are to be all of the elements 
and degrees of this suffering no man can fully 
know, any more than he can know all of the de- 
grees of joy and happiness which shall be enjoyed 
by the heirs of everlasting life when they shall be 
welcomed into heaven. There will be the loss of 
holiness and happiness, the loss of heaven and' 
eternal life. There will be remorse for unimproved 
opportunities and unaccepted offers of mercy. 
There will be separation from friends and kin- 
dred and from all that is high and holy and good. 
There will be the removal of all restraints of virtue 
and home and law and gospel. There will be the 
presence of all that is sinful and evil and deprav- 
ing. There will be the company of the lost of men 
and of the devil and his angels. There will be 
the taunts and jeers and scoffs and curses of con- 
demned men and angels. There will be the inflic- 
tion of all the positive pains and penalties included 
in the curse described as the second death. Sin 
when it is finished bringeth forth death — sin that 
might have been avoided — that might have been 
escaped — that separates from God and heaven 
and happiness and that shuts up in hell the lost 
with the Devil and all of his demons forever and 
forever. I beseech you to turn away from the sin 
that leads to such a doom and flee for refuge to 



SIN 117 

lay hold upon the hope set before you in the gospel. 
" Let the wicked forsake his way and the unright- 
eous man his thoughts and let him return unto the 
Lord and He will have mercy upon him and unto 
our God for He will abundantly pardon." 



CHAPTER X 
THE LAW 

Since we owe to God love and obedience we may 
reasonably expect from Him a law to direct us in 
our efforts to serve Him. That law He has given 
in the Ten Commandments. These lay down the 
great fundamental principles by which our lives 
are to be regulated. They set forth the general 
duties which we owe to God and man. The Savior 
summed up the whole law in love to God and man. 
The duties which we owe to God are taught in the 
Commandments of the first table, and the duties 
which we owe to man are set forth in the Com- 
mandments of the second table. In order to ascer- 
tain the true meaning of the several precepts of 
the decalogue certain rules have been agreed upon 
by the best interpreters of the law. The first of 
these rules is that: 

1. It is to be borne in mind that the law is spirit- 
ual, applying not only to the outward conduct of 
the life, but to the thoughts of the mind and the 
desires of the heart. Paul alludes to this rule of 
interpretation when he says " We know that the 
law is spiritual." " I had not known lust, except 

the law had said, ' Thou shalt not covet.' (Ro- 

118 



THE LAW 119 

mans 7:7, 14.) It was according to this princi- 
ple that Christ taught that he who was angry with 
his brother without cause was guilty of murder and 
that the seventh commandment could be violated 
by the sinful desires of the heart as well as by 
overt acts. 

2. A second rule of interpretation is that an af- 
firmative precept includes a negative and a nega- 
tive includes an affirmative. For example, the 
command which enjoins a good prohibits the op- 
posite evil and the precept which forbids a given 
evil enjoins the contrary good. When God bids us 
honor our parents He thereby forbids our dishonor- 
ing them. When He says, " Thou shalt not kill," 
He teaches us to use all lawful means to preserve 
life. 

3. In the precepts of the moral law one sin of a 
given class stands for the entire class; so that 
when one sin is forbidden, all similar sins are con- 
demned. Thus when it is written, " Thou shalt not 
steal," all actions which tend to deprive others of 
that which of right belongs to them, are condemned 
as wrong. All cheating, defrauding and robbing, 
by whatever means accomplished, are forbidden by 
the one precept, " Thou shalt not steal." 

4. The cause must be regarded as included in the 
effect, the genus in the species and the correlative 
in the relative. When stealing is forbidden, its 
cause, covetousness, is condemned. Under the pro- 
hibition of murder, cherished anger is included. 
Under taking the name of God in vain, all lack of 



120 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

reverence of God, His name, His works, His Word 
and His worship, is included. When the duties of 
children are enjoined upon them, parents are 
taught to be worthy of the honor implied in the 
discharge of such duties to them. 

5. Duties to God should take precedence of du- 
ties to man and moral precepts should outrank 
positive commands. " We ought to obey God 
rather than man," and " I will have mercy and not 
sacrifice." That is, though the sacrifice was en- 
joined by positive precept, it was not to interfere 
with the exercise of mercy. 

By a careful and prayerful application of these 
rules we may arrive at a correct knowledge of the 
meaning of the law, and knowing its meaning we 
are bound to seek to regulate our actions accord- 
ing to its precepts. 

1. The first commandment teaches us to wor- 
ship God alone. We are to allow no other being 
or object to gain that place in our heart's affec- 
tion which belongs of right to Him. We are to 
recognize in Him one worthy of our highest love 
and adoration. We must give to Him the first and 
best place in our hearts, and own and acknowledge 
Him to be our Lord and our God, — the being to 
whom we look for the supply of all of our wants 
and for protection from all evil. We are to see in 
Him the highest good and the supreme authority 
and to own Him as " our all-comprehending Good 
and our all-disposing Lord." To him we are to 
render thanksgiving and praise for all that He is 



THE LAW 121 

and for all that He hath done. To Him we must 
confess our sins, and from Him hope for pardon 
and acceptance through His Son. To Him we 
must look for guidance in perplexity, strength in 
weakness, pardon in guilt, salvation from sin and 
introduction into the blessings of holiness and the 
joys of Heaven. He is so wise and powerful and 
just and good that He is worthy of all of the af- 
fections of our hearts and all of the adoration of 
our souls. " Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God 
and Him only shalt thou serve." 

2. TJie second commandment teaches us to wor- 
ship God directly and thus to shun idolatry. 
" God is a spirit and they who worship Him must 
worship Him in spirit and in truth, for He seeketh 
such to worship Him." He saw that if men were 
permitted to worship Him through images, their 
minds would be turned away from Him and that 
they would gradually learn to worship the wood 
and stone idols to which they had been accustomed 
to bow with such reverence. His own chosen peo- 
ple often fell into this sin and many since their day 
have bowed before idols in worship rather than be- 
fore the Lord God who made them. Hence the 
plain and positive command, " Thou shalt not 
make unto thee any graven image or any likeness 
of anything that is in heaven above or that is in 
the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the 
earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, 
nor serve them ; for I, the Lord thy God, am a 
jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers 



122 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

upon the children unto the third and fourth gen- 
erations of them that hate Me, and showing mercy 
unto thousands of them that love Me and keep My 
commandments." 

3. The third commandment teaches us how to 
worship God. It teaches us to worship Him with 
reverence and Godly fear. It teaches us to rev- 
erence God's name, His word and His work. We 
must become so impressed with the holiness and 
majesty of God that we will not use lightly His 
name, nor treat with contempt His Word, nor 
profane His house, nor undervalue His works. 
His name stands for all that He is, and hence to 
take His name in vain is to dishonor His person. 
His Word is a revelation of His will and character. 
Hence to treat it with contempt is to ignore the 
majesty and glory of God. His works are the 
outward expressions of the thoughts of His mind. 
To treat these lightly is to refuse to consider seri- 
ously the beautiful expressions of supreme knowl- 
edge and wisdom. " Thou shalt not take the name 
of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not 
hold him guiltless that taketh His name in vain." 

4. The fourth commandment teaches us to " re- 
member the Sabbath day to keep it holy." God 
richly deserves one seventh of our time as an ac- 
knowledgment of His gift to us of all time. And 
we need the Sabbath as a day of rest and medita- 
tion and worship and spiritual service. Unless we 
have a regular, stated time for the study of His 
Word, for the worship of His great and holy be- 



THE LAW 123 

ing and for seeking the spiritual welfare of our- 
selves and others we will be apt to neglect these 
duties altogether. The man who does not wor- 
ship God in His sanctuary regularly on the Sab- 
bath is in danger of ceasing to worship Him alto- 
gether. The man who does not cultivate his re- 
ligious nature by setting apart the time of the 
Sabbath day for meditation, prayer, public wor- 
ship and deeds of kindness and charity to his fel- 
lowmen, is in danger of allowing that part of his 
being to go uncultivated. " Remember the Sab- 
bath day to keep it holy." 

5. Of all of the duties which we owe to man 
those which we owe to our fathers and mothers 
come first. Hence the next commandment is : 

" Honor thy father and thy mother that thy 
days may be long in the land which the Lord thy 
God giveth thee." Our parents are God's repre- 
sentatives in the home. They receive us from God 
and have laid upon them the duty of training us 
for God and for the welfare of our fellowmen. 
The father is the prophet of God to teach the truth 
in His name. He is a priest, that he may lead the 
worship and devotion of his children before God. 
And he is the king that he may require at their 
hands all of that which God teaches in His Word. 
Just in proportion as parents recognize and ful- 
fill the obligations that thus rest upon them to 
train their children for God, will it be the duty of 
the children to render unto them honor and obe- 
dience in the Lord. " Children obey your parents 



124 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

in all things, for this is acceptable unto God." 
Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days 
may be long in the land which the Lord thy God 
giveth thee." 

6. Next we are to regard and treat life as a 
sacred gift from God. He gives to each man the 
precious boon and none but He, or His appointed 
agents, may take it away. It is the condition of 
all earthly enjoyment and the opportunity of serv- 
ice for God and man, and of preparation for the 
life to come. Hence you have no right to rob man 
of his life. You cannot restore it if you take it 
away, neither can you escape the curse which God 
hath pronounced against those who shed man's 
blood. " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man 
shall his blood be shed." 

7. The seventh commandment is aimed against 
the violation of the marriage covenant. This capi- 
tal sin is selected as the representative of all lesser 
sins of the same kind. It is the worst of its class, 
because it undermines the foundation of the home, 
destroys all pure affection between the husband and 
wife, overwhelms the innocent party with a spirit 
of jealousy and revenge, and the guilty party with 
shame and despair. It robs the children of a true 
father or mother and brings upon all of the parties 
a bereavement worse than death. Along with this 
sin all kindred crimes are condemned and their op- 
posite virtues commended. Our standards teach 
that " this commandment requireth the preserva- 
tion of our own and our neighbor's chastity, in 



THE LAW 125 

heart, speech and behavior," and " forbiddeth all 
unchaste thoughts, words and actions." They 
teach the little children " to be pure in heart, lan- 
guage, and conduct." The Savior authorized this 
interpretation, when He branded as violators of 
this command those who should be guilty of im- 
pure thoughts. Hear and obey the voice of God 
as He says, " Thou shalt not commit adultery." 

8. The eighth commandment is intended to warn 
men against the attempt to rob others of that 
which belongs to them, and so to guard men in the 
possession of their property. It throws around 
one's possessions a wall of defence through which 
no one may break without incurring the displeas- 
ure of God as well as the anger of man. It teaches 
us to be honest and industrious. It requireth the 
promotion of our own and our neighbors' worthy 
prosperity and forbiddeth every thing that can or 
may hinder such prosperity. All plans and 
schemes for cheating, defrauding and robbing are 
condemned., All tricks of trade, such as defect in 
weights and measures, and all misrepresentation, 
extortion and deception are forbidden, and men are 
taught to do unto others as they would have others 
do unto them, under similar circumstances. This 
is a lesson which needs to be taught and learned in 
our day, when business men tell us that it is actu- 
ally easier to make money than it is to keep it 
safely against the greed and dishonesty of the 
many who would take it from its lawful owners. 

9. Tlie ninth commandment teaches us to tell the 



126 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

truth, and to guard with care our own good name 
and that of our neighbor. It binds upon us, as 
witnesses, to tell the truth, the whole truth and 
nothing but the truth. It teaches us, in business 
and social life, to speak the truth in heart and 
word and action. It forbids whatever is false and 
everything that is prejudicial to the truth or in- 
jurious to our own good name or that of our 
neighbor. 

10. The tenth commandment is aimed against 
covetousness and teaches us to be content with our 
lot and to maintain a right and charitable frame of 
mind toward our neighbor and all that is his. It 
forbids discontent, envy and grief at the good for- 
tune of our neighbor, and all inordinate and un- 
lawful desire to get by unfair means that which 
does not belong to us. It shows that God requires 
us to refrain from sinful desires as well as from 
sinful actions. " Thou shalt not covet." That is, 
thou shalt not want more than legally belongs to 
you, nor more than you can lawfully acquire. 
Just so, all of the commands of God lay hold upon 
the heart and conscience of man: and He teaches 
us in His Word that He " requireth truth in the 
inward parts " and that " love is the fulfilling of 
the law." 

From his exposition of the law, it will be seen 
that, though the law can never be a means of salva- 
tion, it is still in force and has many valuable 
uses. It is a great mistake to suppose, as some 



THE LAW 127 

have held, that the coming of Christ abrogated the 
moral law or that it is of no further service. On 
the contrary He expressly taught that He came 
" not to destroy but to fulfill the law," and that 
" one jot or tittle should in no wise pass from the 
law till all be fulfilled." As to the uses of the 
law: 

It reveals the character of God. It makes 
known the view that God takes of the duties which 
man owes alike to Himself and to man, and thus 
teaches how just and holy and wise and good is 
the Author of the law. 

It convinces of sin and thus leads us to look 
out of ourselves to Christ for salvation. Paul 
says he had not known sin but that the law had 
said, " Thou shalt not covet " ; that he was alive 
without the law, but that when the law came, sin 
revived and he died. That is, he thought himself 
good and righteous until he examined the law, but 
that then he saw that he was sinful and lost. 
Thus the law became a school-master to lead him to 
Christ. 

It serves as a means of sanctification by re- 
vealing the wrong and holding up the right. It is 
the very expression of God's truth but truth is the 
instrument which the Holy Spirit uses for man's 
growth in grace and holiness. " Sanctify them 
through thy truth ; thy word is truth," was the 
prayer of the Savior in behalf of His people. By 
the blessing of the Spirit upon the truth and upon 



128 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the heart of the believer, he " is enabled to die 
more and more unto sin and to live more and more 
unto righteousness." 

The law will serve as a means of restraining 
the wicked from sin. When men read and hear the 
law and consider the penalties which will fall upon 
those who break its precepts, they will, to a large 
extent, be deterred from sin. Some may still defy 
the law, but many will stand in awe and seek to 
avoid overt acts of disobedience. The law is still 
the rule by which the Christian man must regulate 
his life. 

Christ declared that it became Him to fulfill 
all righteousness, so should His followers feel that 
they should seek to keep every precept of the law 
so far as possible. 

Then it is by the law that men are to be 
judged at the last day. The law as applied to the 
thoughts and feelings, the words and deeds of men, 
will reveal to them and to others the sins of which 
they have been guilty. When the books are opened 
and men are judged according to the things which 
are written in the books," the book of the law will 
be one of those books, and men will be made to see 
that their sins deserve whatever punishment the 
Judge of all of the earth shall decide ought to be 
inflicted, so that " Every mouth will be stopped and 
all of the world will become guilty before God." 
" Therefore by the deeds of the law shall no flesh 
living be justified, for by the law is the knowledge 
of sin." (Romans 3:19, 20.) 



THE LAW 129 

Only they who look to Christ and trust in Him 
alone for salvation may hope to stand pardoned 
and accepted before the bar of God at the judg- 
ment of the great day. Christ kept the law per- 
fectly and paid its precepts fully so that all 
who are found in Him shall be openly owned and 
acquitted in that day of reckoning. " Believe on 
the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." 
(Acts 16:31.) 



CHAPTER XI 
GOD'S PLAN OF RESCUE 

A wise man always has a plan and a purpose con- 
cerning any work he would do. The architect 
forms a plan of the house before he begins to build. 
The farmer has a plan before he plants his crop; 
and the general makes his plan of campaign before 
he begins the battle. So God, in whose image man 
was made, has a plan and purpose in all that He 
does. Sometimes man finds that his plan was not 
wise or that he is not able to carry out his plan 
and hence must change or give it up, but God's 
plans are always wise and He has power and re- 
sources such that He can always carry them out. 
His plan was so comprehensive that it embraced 
from eternity all that He proposed to do through- 
out all time. " Known unto God are all of His 
works from the beginning." (Acts 15:18.) 
" Our God is in the heavens : He hath done whatso- 
ever He pleased." (Psalms 115 : 3.) 

He had a plan concerning creation and carried 
it out so successfully that He pronounced it to be 
" very good," and all who investigate its constitu- 
tion and nature discover countless evidences of 

wisdom and design. 

130 



GOD'S PLAN OF RESCUE 131 

He had a plan of the providence He would exer- 
cise over all His creatures, and He has carried out 
in the past and is still carrying out that plan with- 
out in any wise destroying their free agency and 
yet in such a way as to bring to pass with unerring 
certainty all of His wise and holy will, so that it 
may be written, " He doeth according to His pleas- 
ure in the armies of heaven and among the inhabi- 
tants of the earth." And, " in Him we live and 
move and have our beings." 

As in creation and providence, so it is in re- 
demption God hath a definite plan. He purposed, 
from all eternity, to save a great multitude which 
no man can number, to be gathered out of every 
nation and kindred and tribe and people. In 
covenant with His Son, He said, " Ask of me 
and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheri- 
tance and the uttermost parts of the earth for 
thy possession." And of His Son He wrote, " He 
shall see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied ; 
and by His knowledge shall My righteous servant 
justify many, for He shall bear their iniquities." 
Concerning this covenant Christ said, " All that 
the Father hath given Me shall come to Me, and 
Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast 
out." To His people He will at last say, " Come, 
ye blessed of my Father ; inherit the kingdom pre- 
pared for you from the foundation of the world." 
The work of calling, guiding and saving His peo- 
ple will all be His, so that they must all say, " Who 
hath saved us not according to our works, 



132 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

but according to His own purpose and grace in 
Christ Jesus, before the world began." (Ephe- 
sians 1:4, 5.) The plan and purpose of salva- 
tion was present and formed in the divine Mind 
before the world began, but was not to be made 
known till needed by fallen man. According to 
this plan, God was to give His Son to remove 
all legal obstacles to man's salvation and the 
Holy Ghost to remove all moral and spirit- 
ual deficiencies. In a previous chapter we saw 
that Adam, as our natural and federal head, stood 
as our representative and was given to understand 
that whatever moral and legal status he might se- 
cure by his conduct for himself he would also se- 
cure for all those whom he represented. If for 
a time he continued holy and innocent, he and they 
would be confirmed in that condition and so secure 
the blessings of life eternal. But if he became sin- 
ful and guilty, so would they. The destiny of all 
of his posterity was linked with his. When God 
would recover man from his fallen condition, He 
sends Christ to secure for all those whom He repre- 
sented the status which He was to maintain before 
God. As He was innocent, so should all whom 
He represented become by virtue of His life and 
death on their behalf; and as He was holy so, by 
His Spirit, should they become holy. As He was 
to gain the victory over death and Hell, so should 
they. As he was to enter into the heavenly in- 
heritance, so should they. As He was heir of 
God, they, by union with Him, were to be heirs of 



GOD'S PLAN OF RESCUE 133 

God and joint heirs with Him to the heavenly in- 
heritance. It was in accordance with this plan 
that Paul could write concerning God's work for 
himself and others, " Who hath saved us and called 
us with a holy calling, not according to our works, 
but according to His own purpose and grace in 
Christ Jesus before the world began." 

In effecting this salvation, God was carrying out 
His purpose formed in Christ before the world be- 
gan. God foresaw all that would come upon man 
through the sin of his first representative, and de- 
termined to prevent defeat by the appointment of a 
second representative who would be faithful to the 
trust committed to Him and secure the salvation 
of all who put their trust in Him. This salvation 
to be wrought out by Christ would provide for the 
adjustment of all the legal difficulties in the way 
and at the same time for the removal of all of the 
moral evils in the way of salvation through the 
work of the Spirit whom He would send forth to 
apply the redemption to man's heart. 

With the outlines of this plan you are already 
familiar. You know how, " God so loved the world 
that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoso- 
ever believeth on Him should not perish, but have 
everlasting life." You know what Christ did to 
rescue guilty and condemned sinners from the curse 
of the law and to bring them into a condition of 
pardon and acceptance with God. He was born 
under the law, and did and suffered in our stead 
all that God required of us. He rendered a per- 



134 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

feet obedience and paid fully the penalty due to 
man's sin, and offered to him the benefit of His obe- 
dience and death. " He became obedient unto 
death even the death of the cross." He gave Him- 
self for us that He might redeem us from all in- 
iquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, 
zealous of good works." Hence it is written, 
" Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the 
law, being made a curse for us ; for it is written 
6 cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.' " 
Christ not only saved His people from the con- 
demnation due to them on account of their sins, 
but restored them to His love and favor. It is 
not only written, " There is, therefore, now no 
more condemnation to them that are in Christ 
Jesus," but also that " We are accepted in the be- 
loved." All of the claims of truth, holiness and 
justice are so met that the man who accepts Christ 
as his Savior is welcomed back into the love and 
confidence of God the Father. Not only so, but 
the man who accepts Christ is brought into the 
family of God and made an heir of all the blessings 
of the household of faith. " To as many as re- 
ceived Him, to them gave He power to become the 
sons of God, even to them that believe on His 
name." " We are all children of God through 
faith in Jesus Christ." 

If we become children of God through Christ, 
then we are sure of all of the privileges and bless- 
ing and honors which are to come to the children 
of God. The care of a tender Heavenly Father 



GOD'S PLAN OF RESCUE 135 

shall be thrown around them, the love of God will 
rest upon them, all of their sins shall be pardoned 
and they shall be received into the number and 
have a right to all of the privileges of the children 
of God. " Behold what manner of love the 
Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be 
called the children of God." Thus by the work of 
Christ the legal difficulties are met and removed, 
and man is restored to the love and favor of God. 

Then, too, God sends the Holy Spirit into the 
heart to call it away from sin and to enlighten it 
in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. " Beloved now 
are we the sons of God and it doth not yet 
appear what we shall be, but we know that when 
He shall appear, we shall be like Him." " We 
all beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, 
shall be changed by the same Spirit into the same 
image." And at last " We shall be satisfied when 
we awake in His likeness." The power and do- 
minion of sin shall be overcome, its pollution 
cleansed away and its very being at last removed 
from the soul. Thus by the work of Christ he is 
brought back into right relations to God and by 
the work of the Holy Spirit he is renewed in the 
image of God. God the Father drew the plan, 
Christ the Son wrought it out and the Holy Spirit 
applies the salvation in such a way as to restore 
to man's soul the image of His Heavenly Father. 
This salvation will be still further extended and 
brought to completion when by the almighty power 
of God the body of the believer shall be raised 



136 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

from the dead, reunited to the soul freed from all 
sin, and welcomed into all of the blessings and 
privileges of eternal life in the kingdom of God in 
heaven. 

We have now learned, as to this plan for recov- 
ering man from the ruin wrought by sin, that it 
is a plan " according to the purpose of God " ; 
that this plan was determined upon from all eter- 
nity, to be executed in the fulness of time ; that it 
was not according to our works that salvation 
was earned or bought, but that it was bestowed 
upon us through the free and sovereign grace of 
God; that it is a salvation in or through Christ 
Jesus — that is, through what He did and suffered 
to redeem us back to God ; and that it was revealed 
and made manifest by the appearing of our Lord 
Jesus Christ who hath abolished death and 
brought life and immortality to light. This is the 
good news brought to us by the revelation of the 
love of God in Christ Jesus. This is God's plan 
of mercy and salvation for lost sinners. It is His 
method of restoring His lost children to His house- 
hold. 

Let us rejoice in the purpose of God's mercy to 
bestow upon us salvation through the gift of His 
Son to be our Redeemer. Had it not been for this 
provision, we must have gone down into the dark- 
ness of spiritual death without God and without 
hope. With a knowledge of this plan we may 
mount up to the light of spiritual life in " the 
presence of God where there is fulness of joy, and 



GOD'S PLAN OF RESCUE 137 

to His right hand where there are pleasures for- 
evermore." Let us seek to be conformed to the 
purpose of Him who hath called us to such a holy 
calling and to such a heavenly destiny. Let us 
" adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all 
things." Let us "let our light so shine before 
men that they may see our good works and glorify 
our Father which is in Heaven." If we have 
never yet learned this plan and never accepted 
the Savior it reveals, let us at once seek this knowl- 
edge and own and acknowledge this Savior. Let 
us bow to His sceptre, acknowledge His right 
to our love and worship, and receive and rest upon 
Him alone for salvation as He is offered to us in 
the gospel. Then will He save us by His grace 
and bring us at last to dwell with Him in glory. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE PERSON OF CHRIST — HIS 
HUMANITY AND DIVINITY 

Christ is the centre of the Christian system, 

and He is the Word by which God reveals Himself 

to man. The gospel is the good news of what 

Christ has done for the salvation of lost sinners. 

He is the foundation on which rests the believer's 

hope of eternal life. He is the light to shine upon 

the way in which the sinner must walk in order 

to reach the celestial city. He is the way from 

earth to heaven. He is the truth to make us wise 

unto salvation, and He is the life by which we can 

escape spiritual and eternal death. He is the 

" author and the finisher of our faith." He is the 

prophet to reveal to us the will of God for our 

salvation. He is the priest to make the sacrifice 

to atone for our sins, and He it is who is to pray 

in our behalf at the throne of God in heaven. He 

is the king who alone can subdue and conquer our 

spiritual enemies and give us the complete victory 

over them in the end. He is the Son of God, the 

Son of man and the Savior of sinners. He is both 

human and divine. 

That He was human few have denied. All who 
138 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST 139 

receive the Bible as an inspired revelation from 
God must admit that it repeatedly sets forth the 
humanity of Christ. He had a real human body 
and a true and reasonable human soul; and the 
human and the divine were united in the one per- 
son of Christ. He was born, He grew, He hun- 
gered, He thirsted, He grew weary, He ate, He 
slept and He was refreshed. He lived and walked 
and talked. He rejoiced and wept. He was 
persecuted, He suffered, sorrowed, was crucified, 
died and was buried. Thus we see that the New 
Testament is full of references to His humanity. 
He was very man, bone of our bone and flesh of 
our flesh. He was " a man of sorrows and ac- 
quainted with grief," and was " tempted in all 
points as we are, yet without sin." The Bible is 
equally clear in its teaching concerning His di- 
vinity. The passages on this subject have been 
gathered together under several classes. It will 
be sufficient to give only the stronger and plainer 
of these, leaving the others to be sought out by 
each individual. 

There are passages which speak of Christ as 
being in existence long before He was born in 
Bethlehem. In this class belong all of those pas- 
sages which speak of the appearance of " the an- 
gel of the covenant " to the patriarchs before the 
birth of Christ. Under the Old Testament dis- 
pensation there appeared to Hagar, to Abraham 
and to Jacob and to Moses a being called " the an- 
gel," " the angel of the covenant," who received 



140 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

divine homage, was called by divine names and 
wrought divine works. To him Hagar prayed. 
He heard her prayer and promised to make of her 
descendants " a great nation." To Abraham he 
revealed himself as Jehovah, gave him command- 
ment to sacrifice his son Isaac, and, when Abra- 
ham's faith failed not, prevented the sacrifice, say- 
ing, " Thou hast not withheld from Me thy son." 
(Genesis 22: 13.) And he called the name of the 
place " Jehovah- jireh," " Jehovah will provide." 
Now the prophets Isaiah and Malachi foretold 
that there would come a forerunner of this angel 
and that he would himself " come suddenly into the 
temple " to assert his power and authority. 
When John the Baptist came he claimed that he 
was that forerunner and so had fulfilled that part 
of the prophecy, and that Christ would soon come 
and fulfill the other part of it. This Christ did by 
entering His own temple and there asserting His 
authority and exerting His power. Jesus, then, 
was the angel of the covenant and under that form 
had appeared to the fathers to comfort and guide 
them and teach them the way of life. He existed 
and manifested Himself to Israel two thousand 
years before He was born in Bethlehem. This 
could be asserted of no mere man. But there are 
passages which carry His existence far back of 
the patriarchs. He Himself declared " Before 
Abraham was, I am." (John 8:58.) The Jews 
had said to Him : " Thou art not yet fifty years 
old, and hast thou seen Abraham ? " " Wast 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST 141 

thou a contemporary with Abraham?" "Yea," 
said Christ, " before Abraham was, I am." " I 
was already in existence before Abraham's day, 
before Abraham was born." But stronger, if 
possible, than this is the passage in the first chap- 
ter of John, verses one and two : " In the begin- 
ning was the Word and the Word was with God 
and the Word was God." In the very beginning 
of creation, before anything was made, even then 
was Christ in existence, dwelling with His Father 
in the glory which He had with Him before the 
world was. This accords with the statement in 
the eighth chapter (verse 23) of Proverbs, " I 
was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, 
ere ever the earth was." Thus the Scriptures 
trace the existence of Christ back into, eternity 
and lead us to think of Him as eternal and divine 
like His Father. 

The next step is to see that the names of God 
are given to Christ. In the first chapter of the 
Gospel of John the " Word " plainly refers to 
Christ. A word spoken reveals the thought that 
before lay concealed in the mind. So Christ came 
forth to reveal the thought of God concerning our 
salvation, and hence is called the " Logos," the 
Word. Now of this Word it is said, " In the be- 
ginning was the Word, and the Word was with 
God and the Word was God." Then, to put it 
beyond all doubt that reference was had to Christ, 
it is said in the same context, " The Word was 
made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His 



142 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the 
Father, full of grace and truth." (Verse 14.) 
" The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom 
of the Father, He hath declared Him." (Verse 
18.) In the ninth chapter of Romans Paul uses 
this striking language: "And of whom" (re- 
ferring to the Jewish nation) " Christ came, who 
is God over all, and blessed forever. Amen." 
(Verse 5.) This passage alone should put beyond 
all doubt the fact that the Bible calls Christ God 
in the highest and most exclusive sense. He is 
represented as expressly addressed as God. 
" Unto the Son He saith, ' Thy throne, O God, is 
forever and ever.'" (Hebrews 1:8.) The 
apostle Thomas, who had ample opportunity to 
know Him and who was inspired to reveal His 
will, fell before Him saying : " My Lord and my 
God " ; and so have all true disciples who have 
learned from the Word of God that Christ is rep- 
resented as being coeternal with God the Father 
and as entitled to the same names that apply to 
Him. 

Not only the names but the attributes of God 
are ascribed to Christ. Eternity is attributed to 
Him. He " was in the beginning with God " be- 
fore anything was made, and He had enjoyed 
glory with the Father " before the world was." 
(John 1:2 and 17:5.) Of Him as a ruler the 
prophet says, " Thou, Bethlehem, Ephrata, . . . 
out of thee shall come forth unto me, that is to 
be a Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST 143 

been ever of old, from everlasting." (Micah 
5:2.) And Christ says, "I am Alpha and 
Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and 
the Last." 

Omnipresence. He promised to be with His 
people wherever they assembled for prayer or for 
worship and to His ministers that He would be 
with them " alway unto the end of the ages." 
(Matthew 28:20.) 

Omniscience. He claims to have a knowledge 
of God the Father as complete and perfect as the 
Father has of Him. " No man knoweth the Son 
but the Father; neither knoweth any man the 
Father save the Son, and He to whomsoever the 
Son will reveal Him." (Matthew 11 : 27.) " He 
knew all men, and needed not that any should tes- 
tify of man, for He knew what was in man." (John 
2 : 23. ) He could read at a glance every secret of 
every heart — could see the sin there, the strug- 
gle, the desire, the temptation, the sorrow and the 
burden. This was necessary to qualify Him to 
be the Teacher and the Priest and Savior of men. 
He must know the needs of the soul before He can 
supply those needs. He must know the sickness 
before He can apply the remedy. 

Immutability. " Jesus Christ, the same yester- 
day, today and forever." (Hebrews 12 : 8 and 
1:10.) 

Omnipotence. In the description given of 
Christ in the Epistle to the Hebrews we have this 
language : " Who, being the brightness of the 



144 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Father's glory and the express image of His per- 
son, and upholding all things by the word of His 
power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, 
sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on 
high." (Hebrews 1:3.) Christ claimed equal 
honor and power with the Father. He said, as 
He sent forth His disciples to the mighty task of 
preaching the gospel to all of the world, " All 
power is given unto Me in Heaven and earth." 
(Matthew 28:18.) He hath the keys of death 
and hell. He can open and no man can shut, 
and He can shut and no man can open. He is 
destined to reign till every knee shall bow and 
every tongue confess that He is Lord to the glory 
of God the Father. Divine works are ascribed 
to Christ. He is represented as creating all 
things. " All things were made by Him and with- 
out Him was not any thing made that was made. 
(John 1:3.) "He was in the world and the 
world was made by Him." (John I: 10.) " For 
by Him were all things created that are in heaven, 
and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether 
they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or 
powers ; all things were created by Him and for 
Him and by Him all things consist." (Colos- 
sians 1:16-17.) No language could have been 
selected that would have expressed more clearly 
and more emphatically the thought that Christ 
made all things both in heaven and on earth. He 
not only created all things, but He " upholds all 
things by the word of His power," and " by Him 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST 145 

all things consist." He has the power to preserve 
and uphold that which He hath made. The won- 
derful miracles which He wrought were an evidence 
of His power. He could heal the sickness which 
no earthly physician could cure. He could speak 
the word and the leper was made clean and whole. 
He could open the blind eyes, unstop the deaf ears, 
give speech to the dumb and raise the dead. He 
had power not merely to save the body from the 
power of demons, disease and death, but to save 
the soul from guilt and sin and spiritual death. 
" Because I live, ye shall live also." " He that 
believeth on Me hath everlasting life and I will 
raise him up at the last day." He had power 
over death and demons and the devil. He is at 
last to judge the quick and the dead and to cast 
the arch enemy of God and man, and all who ally 
themselves with him, into the prison house of the 
lost to be punished forever and ever. 

Then, too, religious worship is to be given to 
the Son as well as to the Father. God warns men 
against idolatry and against the worship of men 
or angels : " Thou shalt have no other gods be- 
fore me." " Thou shalt worship the Lord thy 
God and Him only shalt thou serve." But he ex- 
pressly teaches both men and angels to worship 
His Son. " When He bringeth in the first begot- 
ten into the world, He saith, ' And let all the an- 
gels of God worship Him.'" (Hebrews 1:6.) 
Christ claimed this as His right : " The Father 
. . . hath committed all judgment unto the Son; 



146 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that all men should honor the Son even as they 
honor the Father." (John 5:23-24.) The 
honor which is given the Father must be given by 
men to the Son. If they sing the praises of God 
the Father, they must sing the praises of the Son. 
If they bow before the throne to worship the 
Father, they must bow there to worship the Son 
also. If they pray to the Father, they must 
pray to the Son. If they love and trust and serve 
the Father, they must love and trust and serve the 
Son. His name is " above every name that at 
the name of Jesus every knee should bow and that 
every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is 
Lord to the glory of God the Father." (Philippi- 
ans 2:10, 11.) 

The early Christians worshipped Christ. They 
became known as they who called upon His name. 
Stephen died the death of a martyr, " calling upon 
God and saying, ' Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.' " 
God's people in all ages, and in all lands where 
the gospel has been preached, have always wor- 
shipped Christ in prayer and song, and the re- 
deemed in Heaven are represented as saying, 
" Thou art worthy to take the book and to open 
the seals thereof, for Thou wast slain and hast 
redeemed us to our God by thy blood, out of every 
kindred and tongue and people and nation; and 
hast made us unto our God kings and priests : 
and we shall reign upon the earth." (Revelations 
5:9.) Surely, then, there can be no doubt but 
that God intended that we should regard and treat 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST 147 

Christ as divine as well as human, and that we 
should give to Him the highest place in the 
thought of our minds, the affections of our hearts 
and the service of our lives. He should be to us 
" the chiefest among ten thousand and the one al- 
together lovely." 

In the light of this study it may be well said: 
" It is impossible to explain the life, character 
and works of Christ unless we accept the account 
of His nature and origin given to us in the Word 
of God." It requires the Christ of the gospel to 
explain the history which has taken place in the 
ages past. It requires the Christ of the gospel 
to satisfy the needs of the souls of men in the 
present ; and it will require the Christ of the gos- 
pel to meet the demands of the hearts and lives of 
men in the future ; and it will require the Christ 
revealed in the gospel to call forth the love and 
adoration, the worship and service of the redeemed 
throughout all eternity. 

On what a sure and solid foundation is built 
the hope of the man who hath put his trust in 
Christ, the Rock of Ages ! How safe the be- 
liever who hath committed his soul to the keeping 
of this divine Savior ! " Who shall separate us 
from the love of Christ ? Shall tribulation, or dis- 
tress, or persecution or famine or nakedness, or 
peril or sword? . . . Nay, in all of these things 
we are more than conquerors through Him that 
loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death 
nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, 



148 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

nor things present nor things to come, nor height 
nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to 
separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ 
Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8 : 85-39.) 

Have you trusted in this wise and mighty, ten- 
der and faithful Savior? If not, do so at once. 
His character deserves your trust and love, your 
worship and service. You need His guidance and 
help in life. You will need His supporting grace 
in the hour of death; and you will need Him to 
plead your cause when you stand before God at 
the judgment of the great day. 



CHAPTER XIII 
THE ATONEMENT 

So long as man remained holy ? there was har- 
mony between God and him. But when sin entered 
the soul of man, enmity sprang up there so that 
he was no longer subject to the law of God as a 
willing, loyal subject, but said, in heart and con- 
duct, that he would not have God to rule over him. 

On the other hand, God, who had hitherto 

looked with favor and approval upon man and had 

" talked to him face to face as friend talks to 

friend," now began to manifest towards him His 

righteous indignation and to inflict upon him the 

threatened punishment. Man lost communion 

with God, and God pronounced upon him the curse 

of a broken law. He drove him forth from His 

presence and placed there the flaming sword, the 

emblem of His justice and wrath. Yet God still 

loved man with the love of pity and compassion, 

and provided a way by which sin could be pardoned 

and man be received back into His love and favor. 

That plan by which this was to be accomplished 

is called the atonement. It points to the work 

of Christ by which all of the legal obstacles to 

man's redemption are removed. It is the founda- 
149 



150 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

tion of all practical piety and the basis of the 
Christian's hope of pardon and acceptance with 
God. It is, therefore, important that every one 
should have clear and distinct views as to the mean- 
ing of the atonement. The Hebrew word denotes 
" to cover over " and then to forgive, to propiti- 
ate. The idea seems to be " to cover over an of- 
fense from the eye of off ended justice by means 
of sufficient satisfaction, or the averting of the 
dreadful legal consequences of sin by means of the 
interposition of Christ in the sinner's behalf." 
As the Destroying Angel, when he saw the blood 
applied to the lintel and the door post of the house 
of the Israelite passed over that house, so when 
the blood of the Lamb of God has been applied 
to the soul of man he will be safe from the sword 
of God's justice. The Greek term means " recon- 
ciliation, the removal of some hindrance to concord 
and fellowship." The English word denotes the 
act of reconciling or uniting parties at variance 
— the setting them at one — at-one-ment. When 
Moses saw two brethren quarreling, he acted the 
part of a peacemaker, a mediator and is said to 
have " set them at one." So Christ has become a 
mediator between God and the sinner, and by what 
He has done and suffered has brought about a 
reconciliation between God and man, has restored 
them to a state of oneness and harmony. It is, 
therefore, God's plan for restoring harmony be- 
tween Himself and man. It is the reconciliation 
brought about between God and man by the obe- 



THE ATONEMENT 151 

dience, suffering and death of Christ in the sin- 
ner's stead. It is the result of the satisfaction 
rendered by Christ to the law by all He did and 
suffered in man's stead. He obeyed the law per- 
fectly and paid the penalty fully, so that it is writ- 
ten, " There is, therefore, now no more condemna- 
tion to them that are in Christ Jesus." Christ 
hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being 
made a curse for us." " We are reconciled to God 
by the death of His Son. And not only so, but 
we joy in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by 
whom we have now received the atonemment." 

The necessity of such a work on the part of 
Christ in order to effect reconciliation between God 
and man has been called in question by at least 
two classes. There are some who not only deny 
that an atonement was made, but also that it was 
necessary. They hold that God could and does 
pardon sin without any satisfaction to His law 
and justice. They ignore all other attributes 
that they may magnify His goodness and mercy, 
and claim that He is too merciful to punish sin- 
ners, and that He will, out of mere mercy, with- 
out any reference to law or justice, pardon and 
forgive the sinner. Others distinguish between 
absolute and hypothetical necessity (by the latter 
they mean that which flows from the decree or plan 
of God), and admit that God, having determined 
to pardon man by the plan of the substitution of 
Christ, He must do so, but that otherwise it would 
not be necessary. They admit a fitness in not 



152 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

allowing those who have transgressed the law to 
go unpunished without some suitable notice of such 
transgression and that it is an impressive way of 
calling attention to the evil of sin to have it pun- 
ished in the person of another when remitted to 
the guilty party ; but still they deny that this was 
really necessary and claim that the same result 
might have been secured in some other way, with- 
out such satisfaction — that it was not absolutely 
necessary to man's salvation, but only because 
God adopted that way. The Scriptural view is 
that in order to secure man's salvation it was ab- 
solutely necessary that such satisfaction be made, 
that God has not and could not consistently re- 
ceive man back into His favor without some atone- 
ment — without some satisfaction being rendered 
to His law and justice. The position is that God 
being what He is, it is morally impossible that He 
should receive men into His love and favor at the 
expense of His attributes, which require and 
threaten that sin must and will be punished. 
Every just and adequate conception of God must 
include the attributes of truth and holiness and 
justice. He must keep His word, or we could 
not trust Him. He must be holy, or we could 
not revere Him nor hope to be saved from sin by 
Him. He must be just, or else there will be no 
such thing as punishments and rewards, and all 
incentive to the pursuit of the right will be gone. 
Now if we grant these attributes to God, He must 
punish sin because He has threatened to do so. 



THE ATONEMENT 153 

" In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely 
die." " The wages of sin is death." " The soul 
that sinneth it shall die." He must punish sin 
because He is holy. Being perfectly pure and 
holy in Himself, He cannot approve of sin in 
others. He must hate and oppose it. That op- 
position He has expressed in His law, which threat- 
ens a curse upon all those who continue not in all 
things that are written in the book of the law to 
do them. If He were to remit this punishment 
and receive the sinner back into communion with 
Himself without any punishment, it could be 
charged that He was conniving at sin and teaching 
men to regard it as a light thing that would not 
shut them out from God and heaven. If He in- 
flicted the penalty directly upon man, then man 
must give up all hope of heaven, for it would re- 
quire all eternity in which to pay the penalty of 
everlasting death. The only hope, then, for man 
is that some one of infinite dignity may agree to 
suffer the penalty in his stead — to do and suffer 
all that justice and holiness require of him; that 
some provision be made by which he may be 
cleansed from sin, for it is written, " Without holi- 
ness no man shall see the Lord." This provision 
is found only in the " blood of Jesus Christ, which 
cleanseth from all sin." 

Again, if God be just, He must render unto 
every man according to his due. But that which 
is due to sin is death — spiritual and eternal 
death. Sin is directed against the infinite God 



154 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

and is therefore worthy of punishment of an in- 
finite character. This the sinner cannot pay ex- 
cept as he continues forever and forever under the 
curse and condemnation of the law. Hence the 
necessity of the provision of God's mercy as re- 
vealed in the death of His Son in behalf of guilty 
and lost sinners. " He gave Himself for us that 
He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify 
unto Himself a peculiar people zealous of good 
works." 

So long as God remains true and holy and just, 
it will still be necessary for man to be received 
back into His love and favor only through the 
atonement of Christ. The law of God is such that 
there can be escape in no other way. It requires 
perfect and constant obedience in every thought 
and feeling and word and action, and pronounces 
a curse upon all who fail to render such obedience. 
All who confess that they have not so obeyed the 
law must confess that they are under its condem- 
nation until they accept the righteousness of 
Christ. He obeyed the law perfectly and paid 
the penalty completely and reckoned it to man's 
account. When accepted by faith, man is justi- 
fied from all those things from which he could not 
be justified by the law of Moses. The sanction 
attached to the law of God is such that sin could 
not be allowed to go unpunished. Every one 
knows that a law without sanctions and penalties 
is of no value. If the state of Alabama were to 
publish a law and fail in every case to inflict a 



THE ATONEMENT 155 

penalty for its violation, it would be but a short 
time till the law would be worth no more than that 
much state advice. So God's law without its 
sanctions and penalties would be of little value. 
These must be paid either by the sinner or by his 
substitute. " Without the shedding of blood 
there is no remission." The very nature of sin is 
such that its commission puts the man who com- 
mits it out of right relations to the law. It is a 
violation of the law and brings upon the sinner the 
penalty, and he can never get back into harmony 
with the law till that penalty be paid. If he un- 
dertakes to pay it in his own person he will be 
held forever liable, for " by the deeds of the law 
shall no flesh living be justified." Only as some 
one who owes no obedience nor penalty to the law 
agrees to make the payment for him can he hope 
for pardon and acceptance with God. 

The death of Christ declares plainly the neces- 
sity of such atonement. God would never have re- 
quired the suffering and death of Christ in order 
to man's salvation had there been no necessity for 
it, and Christ would never have undergone the hu- 
miliation, suffering and death of the cross had 
there been no need for it. It was to accomplish a 
great purpose that could not be accomplished in 
any other way that God allowed His well beloved 
Son to " die, the just for the unjust." That pur- 
pose He declares was " to bring us unto God." 
We are brought nigh by the blood of the covenant 
because there is none other name under heaven 



156 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

given among men whereby we must be saved. When 
the Savior drew near to the two disciples on their 
way to Emmaus and found them disappointed and 
in sorrow that Christ had been taken from them 
by death and their hopes of a grand earthly king- 
dom were gone, He rebuked them for their slow- 
ness to understand the teachings of their own 
Scriptures, and added, " Ought not Christ to have 
suffered these things and to enter into his glory? " 

When the inspired writer would set forth the 
priesthood of Christ, he writes, " It is of necessity 
that this man have somewhat also to offer." 
(Hebrews 8:3.) " For if the blood of bulls and 
goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the 
unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, 
how much more shall the blood of Christ, who 
through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without 
spot to God, purge your conscience to serve the 
living God?" (Hebrews 9:13-14.) "And as 
it is appointed unto men once to die, but after 
this the judgment: so Christ was once offered to 
bear the sins of many." (Hebrews 9: £7.) Here, 
then, we have the explicit testimony of God as to 
the necessity of Christ's offering in our behalf. 

The fact that Christ did so offer Himself is as- 
serted over and over again, so that all who receive 
and accept the plain teaching of the Word of God 
must admit that God teaches that as a matter of 
fact Christ has done and suffered in our behalf all 
that is necessary in order to our redemption. For 
example, it is said that " He gave Himself for us 



THE ATONEMENT 157 

that He might redeem us from all iniquity." It 
is said He " suffered for our sins, the just for the 
unjust." (I Peter 3: 18.) Again " He bore our 
sins in His own body on the tree." (I Peter 
2:24.) "He was delivered for our offences." 
(Romans 4 : 25.) And in Romans 5 : 10 it is writ- 
ten : " When we were enemies we were reconciled 
to God by the death of His Son." This is God's 
own explanation of the suffering and death of 
Christ, His Son. It was to atone for sin and to 
bring man back into right relations to God and 
His law. It was to pardon, redeem and save unto 
the uttermost all that come unto God through 
Him. 

The perfection and value of this plan of recon- 
ciliation may be seen by considering the dignity 
and glory of the person and character of Christ. 
He combined in Himself all of the high and noble 
qualities of a perfect man and all of the glorious 
perfections of the infinite God. He was gentle 
and kind and good. He was brave and bold and 
strong. He was faithful and sincere and true. 
He had all of the wisdom and power and holiness, 
justice, goodness, and truth, of God. He was the 
brightness of the Father's glory and the express 
image of his person. He was human so that He 
could suffer, and divine so that He might give 
dignity and value to the offering which He laid 
upon God's altar that He might satisfy divine 
justice and reconcile us to God. He was the 
chiefest among ten thousand and the one alto- 



158 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

gether lovely. His offering, therefore, was such 
as was acceptable to God. It was perfect and 
complete. Then, too, the exactness with which 
He fulfilled every requirement of justice, holiness 
and truth made it of great value in the sight of 
God. From the time when He gave back the re- 
sponse, " Lo, I come ; in the volume of the book 
it is written of me, s I delight to do thy will, 
God,' " until that hour when He cried, on the 
cross, " It is finished," He sought ever to do His 
Father's will and to accomplish the redemption of 
His people. He obeyed the law perfectly and paid 
the penalty fully. He not only gave dignity and 
value to a great sacrifice, but wrought out a great 
and perfect righteousness for guilty and lost sin- 
ners. McChaine says: 

" There is something infinitely grand and glori- 
ous about the righteousness of Christ. When the 
waters of the flood were upon the earth they cov- 
ered the deepest valley and the highest mountain. 
Looking down from above, not one of them could 
be seen, but only the vast expanse of water re- 
flecting the rays of the sun. So the righteousness 
of Christ covers over the deepest depth of our sins 
and the highest mountain top of our iniquity. 
Looking down from above not one of them can be 
seen, but only the vast expanse of the Savior's 
righteousness, reflecting the glory of the great Sun 
of Righteousness." 

The perfection of the atonement is further 
shown by the approval given by the Father. In 



THE ATONEMENT 159 

the beginning of His earthly career God said of 
Him, " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well 
pleased. Hear ye Him." Thrice was this ap- 
probation given, and then, when His work was 
complete, He was received back into glory, thus 
giving assurance that He had done and suffered 
and accomplished all that was expected of Him. 

The extent of the atonement is in keeping with 
its perfection. It accomplishes all God intended 
it should accomplish. There is a sense in which it 
is of service to all of the world. It reveals to 
all of the world the love of God. It exhibits an 
atonement sufficient for all who will accept it. It 
is to be offered to all of the world as the only 
remedy for sin. Even when rejected, it is to be of 
service to all of the world in causing it to be spared 
till a sincere offer of salvation be made to every 
creature. " This gospel of the kingdom shall be 
preached in all of the world for a witness unto all 
nations ; and then shall the end come." (Matthew 
24:14.) 

It is to be made efficient to all those given to 
Christ in the great covenant of grace. " Ask of 
me and I will give thee the heathen for thine in- 
heritance and the uttermost parts of the earth 
for thy possessions," was the promise of the 
Father. " Father, the hour is come ; glorify Thy 
Son, that Thy Son may also glorify Thee. As 
Thou hast given Him power over all flesh that He 
might give eternal life to as many as Thou hast 
given Him," is the prayer of the Savior ; and " All 



i 



160 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that the Father hath given Me shall come to Me," 
is His assurance. The number of those thus 
given may no man know, but we have the best of 
evidence that it will be very great — even a great 
multitude which no man can number, gathered out 
of every nation and kindred and tribe and people. 
When all of God's people of the past and present, 
when the children saved through Christ's atone- 
ment, and the multitudes of the time in the future 
when " a nation shall be born in a day " shall all 
be gathered home to glory, the number of those 
saved may far outnumber those that are lost. 

And yet all will not be saved, for it is a notori- 
ous fact that though the gospel feast be spread 
before the world and the invitation be given in all 
sincerity and earnestness, " Come, for all things 
are now ready," they all " with one consent begin 
to make excuse " — that many will not repent and 
will not believe and will not be saved. This is a 
sad fact that stares us in the face and forbids the 
belief that all will be saved. With this conclusion 
agree the words of Christ ; " Not every one that 
saith unto me, ' Lord, Lord,' shall enter into the 
kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of 
my Father which is in heaven. Many will say 
unto me in that day : ' Lord, have we not prophe- 
sied in thy name and in thy name cast out devils, 
and in thy name done many wonderful works?' 
Then will I profess unto them, ' I never knew you ; 
depart from me, ye that work iniquity.' " 
(Matthew 7 : 22-23. ) " Whosoever, therefore, 



THE ATONEMENT 161 

shall deny me before men, him will I also deny be- 
fore my Father which is in heaven." (Matthew 
10:32.) In that final day of separation He 
tells us He will say to those on His right hand, 
" Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the 
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation 
of the world, 5 ' while to those on the left hand He 
will say, " Depart from me, ye cursed, into ever- 
lasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels." 
" And these shall go away into everlasting punish- 
ment ; but the righteous into life eternal." Not- 
withstanding the infinite value and perfection of 
the atonement, some shall be lost and some saved. 

The atonement is followed by many striking 
results. 

It reveals in brightest light the love of God for 
lost sinners. It teaches us that " God so loved 
the world that He gave His only begotten Son 
that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish 
but have everlasting life." 

It reminds us of the awful evil of sin. It tells 
us that in order that sin might be pardoned and 
the sinner saved, God's own Son must leave heaven, 
become incarnate, suffer, sorrow and die in the 
sinner's place, and rise again for his justification. 

It reveals the means by which the way could be 
opened for God to exercise His mercy towards 
lost sinners without violating His justice, staining 
his holiness or disregarding His truth. Here 
" mercy and truth meet together and righteous- 
ness and peace kiss each other." It furnishes the 



162 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

subject of the new song which the redeemed shall 
sing in glory : " Thou art worthy to take the 
book and open the seals thereof, for thou wast 
slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood 
out of every kindred and tongue and people, and 
hast made us unto our God kings and priests, and 
we shall reign on the earth." To the individual 
shall come many joys and privileges. The love of 
God, pardon and acceptance, justification, salva- 
tion, joy and peace here and eternal happiness 
hereafter. " Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, 
neither have entered into the heart of man the 
things which God hath prepared for them that love 
Him." 



CHAPTER XIV 

SALVATION APPLIED 

Though God the Father hath drawn a perfect 
plan of redemption, and though Christ hath made 
an infinite atonement and wrought out a perfect 
and complete righteousness, and though that 
righteousness hath been clearly revealed and ear- 
nestly offered to man in the gospel as the only 
ground of pardon and acceptance with God, yet 
such is the sinful insensibility of the human heart 
that man will not accept it. The gospel feast 
hath been spread by the love of God and the invi- 
tation sent forth, " Come, for all things are now 
ready," yet " they all with one consent begin to 
make excuse." Not one would come to be a guest 
did not God do more than provide the feast. Did 
not God add the inward, effectual call of the 
Spirit, every member of our fallen race would find 
some excuse to stay away. In his sinful state 
man has no taste for the feast of good things the 
gospel provides. He does not see the suitable- 
ness of the salvation to his needs. Indeed, he does 
not feel deeply his need and does not see his dan- 
ger as he should, and therefore does not seek ref- 
uge and satisfaction in the redemption purchased 
163 



164 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

by Christ. " Ye are not willing to come unto Me 
that ye might have life," was the charge the Sav- 
ior brought against the men of His day, and the 
same charge may be justly brought against the 
men of this day. " The natural man receiveth 
not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can 
he know them for they are spiritually discerned." 
(I Corinthians £: 14.) Hence if men are to be 
saved, God must, by the influence of His Spirit, 
draw them unto Himself and call them into His 
kingdom. He must " make them willing in the 
day of His power." He must " make them par- 
takers of the redemption purchased by Christ by 
the effectual application of it to them by His 
Holy Spirit." This is the Spirit's part in the 
economy of redemption. The Father plans, the 
Son executes and the Spirit applies. The Father 
provides in His plan for the removal of all diffi- 
culties in the way of man's salvation and for the 
bestowal of all its blessings and privileges. The 
Son removes the legal obstacles and the Spirit the 
moral hindrances to salvation, and together the 
three persons of the Trinity invest man with all 
of the riches of grace here and glory hereafter. 

In effecting His part of the work, the Holy 
Spirit does for man several distinct and necessary 
things. First of all, He convinces man of his sin 
and misery. In his natural condition man has no 
adequate conception of the nature and evil of sin. 
He is blind to his faults and insensible to his dan- 
ger. He is like a man walking in darkness, not 



SALVATION APPLIED 165 

knowing whither he goeth. He is like a man be- 
numbed with cold, becoming more and more in- 
sensible as he draws near to death. He is de- 
scribed in the language used concerning the Lao- 
diceans, each of whom is represented as saying, 
" I am rich and increased in goods and have need of 
nothing," and knows not that he " is wretched and 
miserable and poor and blind and naked." When 
the Holy Spirit enlightens the mind and applies 
the truth, He leads the sinner to see sin in its 
true colors and to weigh aright its terrible conse- 
quences. He sees it in all of its deformity and 
destructiveness. He sees that it aims its blows 
against God Himself, that it brings upon man suf- 
fering and sorrow and pain and death, and that it 
required the death and suffering of Christ that 
man might be delivered from its guilt and punish- 
ment. He sees not only that sin is a great evil, 
but that he is personally a sinner. Before Paul 
was brought under conviction, he was proud and 
self-righteous, but when the Spirit revealed to him 
the meaning of the law, he tells us that " sin re- 
vived and he died," — that is, he saw his sinfulness 
and felt that he was under the condemnation to 
death. Job tells us that when he was enabled to 
see the holiness of God in contrast to his own sinful- 
ness, he " abhorred himself and repented in sack- 
cloth and ashes." David declared that " his sin 
was ever before him " ; and the publican cried out 
in shame and anguish, " God be merciful unto me a 
sinner." Thus it is that every man feels when he 



166 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

is brought under conviction for his sin. He ac- 
knowledges that he is sinful. He is filled with 
shame and sorrow for his sin, and acknowledges 
that he is justly condemned for his sin, and longs 
for pardon and for deliverance from its power and 
pollution. 

Another thing which the Holy Spirit does for 
the sinner is to enlighten his mind in the knowledge 
of Christ, As sin prevents man from seeing the 
evil and danger of sin, so it blinds him to the 
beauty and value of Christ as a Savior. As it 
keeps him from feeling the presence and fatal in- 
fluence of the moral leprosy of his soul, so it pre- 
vents him from feeling the need of treatment at 
the hands of the great physician. Not seeing his 
danger from sin, he does not seek deliverance from 
its power. He is blind to all the worth and 
worthiness of Christ the Savior. " There is no 
form nor comeliness in Him that he should desire 
him." He hides, as it were, " his face from him." 
He neglects to listen to His call and walks on in 
his blindness and sin. But when God, by His 
Spirit, enlightens him in the knowledge of Jesus 
Christ, he sees Him to be the very Savior he needs 
that He can teach him all that is necessary to 
salvation, that He did and suffered all that was 
demanded to atone for his sin and to reconcile him 
to God and that He can protect and shield him 
against every enemy and deliver him from every 
danger ; that He is " the chiefest among ten thou- 
sand and the one altogether lovely," that He is 



SALVATION APPLIED 167 

able and willing " to save unto the uttermost all 
that come unto God by Him." 

Then, too, the Spirit renews the will of man, 
and thus enables Him to accept the salvation which 
God's love hath provided. Such is the terrible 
influence of sin upon the soul that it not only 
blinds man as to the evil that threatens his life and 
prevents him from seeing and appreciating the 
offered means of deliverance, but it indisposes him 
for the acceptance of the Savior. It keeps him 
from being able and willing to accept Christ. 
Hence the necessity of a radical change in the 
dispositions of man's heart. Hence the necessity 
of a change of his will. By the will as here used 
we mean, as Doctor Dabney has well said, " not 
the specific power of volution, but that which the 
Reformers and our Standards mean — the whole 
faculty of active desire and purpose " — the seat 
of man's moral dispositions and affections. It is 
here that depravity has its chief seat. While the 
whole soul is depraved by sin, yet the place where 
its power is most influential is in the underlying 
dispositions of the soul, because these give tone 
and direction to the action of the entire being. If 
sin gives character and color to these dispositions, 
it will influence and control the whole character 
and life of the man. The tiger is born with the 
tiger nature, and this determines all the acts of 
its life; so man is born with a sinful nature which 
influences all the thoughts and feelings and words 
and conduct of his life. The bad tree bears bad 



168 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

fruit. The bitter fountain sends forth bitter 
water with infallible certainty. So will man's 
heart bear fruits of sin and send forth streams of 
iniquity till healed and changed by the power of 
divine grace. Though man could see the full evil 
of sin and the power of Christ to pardon and save, 
yet such is his helplessness, apart from the help of 
God, that he could not and would not accept the 
offer of deliverance. He is like the man at the 
pool of Bethesda, sick and helpless in sight of the 
healing waters but unable to step down into them 
in order to be healed. It requires the voice of 
Christ, accompanied by the influence of the Spirit, 
to enable him to rise, take up his bed, and walk. 
He is like the man with the withered hand, utterly 
unable of himself to stretch it forth till Christ 
speaks the word and gives the ability. He is like 
the leprous man, utterly unable to heal himself, 
and so must stand before the Great Physician and 
say in humble reliance upon His power, " Lord, if 
thou wilt, thou canst make me clean." When 
Christ speaks and when Christ sends the Spirit of 
healing, then, and only then, can the leprosy of 
the soul be healed. Then, and only then, can the 
will be renewed and the underlying dispositions of 
the soul be so changed that the sinner will be in- 
clined and enabled to accept Christ and bring 
forth fruits meet for repentance. This work the 
Holy Spirit does for man the sinner. He renews 
his will, changes his heart and imparts to him a 
a new nature, the characteristic feature of which 



SALVATION APPLIED 169 

is holiness. " As many as received Him, to them 
gave He power to become the sons of God, even 
to them that believe on His name which are born 
not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the 
wiU of man, but of God." (John 1 : 13.) " For 
it is God that worketh in you both to will and to 
do His good pleasure." (Philippians 2:13.) 
" Not by works of righteousness which we have 
done, but according to His mercy He saved us, 
by the washing of regeneration and renewing of 
the Holy Ghost." (Titus 3:5.) 

The next blessing the Holy Spirit bestows upon 
the sinner is to persuade and enable him to em- 
brace Jesus Christ as He is freely offered to him 
in the gospel. Having revealed to him the evil 
of sin, pointed him to the Savior and so revealed 
His will as to incline him to seek the blessing of 
salvation, He further persuades and enables him 
to receive and rest upon Christ alone for salvation 
as He is offered to Him in the gospel. While he 
halts between two opinions, hesitating to trust 
the Savior, the Spirit persuades him no longer to 
delay. He causes him to hear and believe the 
declaration, " Behold, now is the accepted time, 
now is the day of salvation." Hearing and be- 
lieving this, under the enabling power of the Holy 
Spirit, he decides no longer to slight the offered 
mercy. Though having no strength in himself, 
he looks for help from Him who hath called him 
into His kingdom and receives the power to be- 
lieve. He is persuaded and enabled to embrace 



170 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Jesus Christ as His Savior from sin, from its 
power and pollution, from its guilt and condemna- 
tion, from its stain and presence in the soul. He 
is thus enabled to look forward to the time when 
he shall be free from all sin and be satisfied by 
awaking with the likeness of his Lord and Re- 
deemer. He accepts Him as his prophet that he 
may be taught and guided in all of his ignorance, 
as his priest that he may receive the benefit of 
the sacrifice He laid on the altar of God to atone 
for sin, and of His prayers and intercession which 
are offered before the Father's throne in heaven, 
and as a king that he may have the privilege of 
membership in His kingdom and be protected and 
defended against all the enemies of his soul. 
Thus the Spirit enables him to receive Christ and 
so secure an interest in all the privileges and the 
blessings of redemption. 

This work of the Spirit in introducing us into 
the possession of the blessings of salvation is of 
such a nature that only a divine agent could ac- 
complish it. He alone can work in us that deep 
and thorough conviction of sin which is necessary 
to lead us to hate and turn from it unto God. 
He alone can open the blind eyes to enable them 
to see and appreciate the salvation of God. He 
alone can change the heart and renew the will. 
And He only can sweetly persuade and enable us 
to take Christ to be our Savior from sin. Hence 
this work is compared to a " creation," to a 
" resurrection from the dead " and to a " quicken- 



SALVATION APPLIED 171 

ing into newness of life." " It is the Spirit that 
quickeneth." " You hath He quickened who were 
dead in trespasses and sins, . . . and raised you 
up and made you to sit together in heavenly 
places in Christ Jesus." " ' Not by might nor by 
power, but by My Spirit,' saith the Lord." Let 
us therefore pray earnestly unto God that this 
saving change may be wrought in our own hearts 
and in the hearts of others. Let us each pray 
with David, " Create in me a clean heart, O God, 
and renew a right spirit within me." He has en- 
couraged us thus to pray by saying, " If ye, being 
evil, know how to give good things unto your 
children, how much more shall your Father which 
is in heaven give His Holy Spirit to them that 
ask Him." Then when our prayers are answered 
and we are become members of His kingdom 
through His gracious call, let us walk worthy of 
God. Let us " adorn the doctrine of God our 
Savior in all things " and " walk worthy of the 
vocation wherewith we are called." " As He who 
hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all man- 
ner of conversation," for it is written, " Be ye 
holy, for I am holy." 



CHAPTER XV 

THE CHANGE OF HEART 

When we ask the question, " How may we be- 
come qualified for membership in the kingdom of 
God?", the Savior gives us the same answer he 
gave Nicodemus : " Ye must be born again," 
that is, a change must be wrought in your soul 
that you may be introduced into a new world of 
spiritual existence just as the birth of a child is 
necessary that it may enter upon its physical and 
mental existence in this world. You can no more 
enter into and enjoy spiritual life without this 
change than a child can enjoy the experiences of 
the natural life without being born. " The new 
birth is a spiritual life, without which you can 
no more live the heavenly life than we could an 
earthly life without being born into this world." 
The dispositions of your soul must be so changed 
that you will prefer holiness to sin and God to 
the world. A new spiritual life must be implanted 
in the soul which shall give tone and direction to 
all of the faculties, exercises and actions of the 
soul. There must be imparted to your soul a new 
nature, the distinguishing feature of which is holi- 
ness, just as the distinguishing feature of your old 

172 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 173 

nature was sin. You must be " created anew in 
Christ Jesus," " raised up from death in trespasses 
and sins " and " made alive in Christ Jesus." 
God must " create in you a clean heart and renew 
within you, a right spirit." This is a super- 
natural work, wrought instantaneously, inter- 
nally, thoroughly and completely. " If any man 
be in Christ Jesus, he is a new creature : old things 
are passed away ; behold all things are become 
new." (II Corinthians 5:17.) 

This change is necessary for all classes and con- 
ditions of sinners, for the moralist as well as for 
the open and avowed transgressor. Human na- 
ture is very much the same everywhere and always. 
The moral image of God has been lost by all and 
must be restored to man before he can know and 
enjoy God and heaven. That act of God by which 
He brings about this change in man's moral na- 
ture which restores to him the divine image is 
called regeneration or the new birth. This is the 
change which our Savior declares must take place 
before a single soul can enter the kingdom of God 
and enjoy its spiritual privileges and blessings. 

The character and dispositions of man's soul 
are such that there must be a change before man 
can be brought into peace and harmony with God 
and into the enjoyment of the blessings of His 
kingdom. The description given in the Word of 
God of the character of man's mind and heart is 
in language which is familiar to you all. It is 
written : 6t The carnal mind is enmity against 



174 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

God; for it is not subject to the law of God, 
neither indeed can be." (Romans 8:7.) "The 
heart of man is deceitful above all things and 
desperately wicked ; who can know it." (Jeremiah 
17:9.) "There is not a just man upon earth 
that doeth good and sinneth not." (Ecclesiastes 
7 : 20. ) This enmity must be slain and subdued 
before man can be brought into friendship and 
communion with God. The heart must be 
cleansed before it will love and serve God. The 
tastes, dispositions and desires that lead him 
away from God and into sin must be revolu- 
tionized and substituted by tastes and desires for 
that which is holy and good. The way of sin is 
the way of death. Before man can have spiritual 
and eternal life he must be delivered from spirit- 
ual death and translated into the glorious light 
and liberty of the sons of God. His eyes must be 
opened that he may see the beauty of holiness. 
His heart must be changed that he may be led to 
love God and his will must be renewed that he may 
be enabled to serve Him. His entire moral na- 
ture must be changed that he may come into fel- 
lowship with Him who is " holy, harmless, mi- 
defiled and separate from sinners." 

The character of God is such as to require 
this change on man's nature before he can be re- 
admitted to the divine presence and favor. 
While man is sinful, God is perfectly holy and 
places before man His holy character as " the 
model into the likeness of which man is to be 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 175 

fashioned before he can be admitted to the privi- 
leges of His kingdom. " Without holiness no 
man shall see the Lord." " As He which hath 
called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of 
conversation." (I Peter 1:15.) "Can two 
walk together except they be agreed?" (Amos 
3:3.) " ' Wherefore come out from among them 
and be ye separate,' saith the Lord, ' and I will 
receive you. And I will be a father unto you 
and ye shall be My sons and daughters ' saith the 
Lord almighty." (II Corinthians 6:17-18.) 

It is true that God hath promised to pardon 
and forgive sinners, but this must be done in such 
a way as not to disregard His own holiness, His 
justice and His truth. Sinners must come plead- 
ing the merit, the suffering and the obedience of 
Christ; they must come confessing their sins and 
they must come hating and forsaking their in- 
iquities. " He that believeth on the Son hath 
life." " If we confess our sins, He is faithful and 
just to forgive our sins." " Let the wicked for- 
sake his way and the unrighteous man his 
thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and 
he will have mercy upon him, and unto our God 
for He will abundantly pardon." But the sinner 
will never thus return and confess and forsake 
his sins until his heart be changed. His sinful 
dispositions will certainly lead him away from 
God and into sin. Hence to win man back to 
Himself God must change the heart of the sin- 
ner. He must make him " willing in the day of 



176 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

His power." He must break for him the fetters 
of sin and draw him with the cords of love that 
he may run after him and be saved." Hence 
the wisdom of David in his sinfulness and weak- 
ness in crying unto God, " Create in me a clean 
heart and renew within me a right spirit, God." 
Until such a change is wrought upon the nature 
of man, he cannot enjoy the spiritual blessings 
God holds out for his acceptance both in this life 
and in that which is to come. 

There are two classes of people under the gos- 
pel dispensation — those who enjoy the worship 
and service of God and those who do not. That 
which draws the line which separates these two 
classes is the presence or absence of the grace of 
God in their hearts. If they have been born into 
the family of God by the power of His Holy Spirit 
they are " glad when we say unto them, ' Let us 
go up into the house of God.' " They find pleas- 
ure and delight in the worship and service of 
God. They like to sing the songs of Zion. They 
like to read and hear the Word of God. They 
like to listen to the gospel of Christ. They like 
to bow before the throne of God in prayer. 
They love the Word of God, the house of God, 
the people of God and the service of God. They 
have been made the children of God and so have 
the spirit of children and the spirit of God 
whereby they cry " Abba," Father. The other 
class are those in whom this change has not yet 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 177 

been wrought. They are at enmity with God. 
They have no taste for His worship and service. 
They do not love His house, nor His word, nor 
His people, nor His worship nor His service. 
" They mind earthly things." They seek most 
earnestly the pleasures, the possessions and the 
honors of this world. They show little interest 
in the extension and building of the kingdom of 
God. They do not seek earnestly to lay up for 
themselves treasure in heaven. They have not 
the mind and spirit of Christ, who spent His 
life doing good and in seeking to lead others into 
the possession of the blessings of the kingdom of 
God. Such persons do not have a real relish for 
spiritual blessings and employments. They do 
not seek as their associates the people of God, 
and do not resort to the house of God as a place 
where their hearts can find comfort and joy and 
gladness. 

Now if such persons cannot find comfort and 
joy in the service of God here, how can they hope 
to do so in heaven? There everything is holy, 
the King, His subjects, their service and employ- 
ments, their worship and adoration. The song of 
the holy angels of heaven is, " Holy, holy is the 
Lord of Hosts, the whole earth is full of His 
glory." The redeemed are represented as say- 
ing, " Glory and honor and power and dominion 
unto Him that sitteth upon the throne," because 
He " hath redeemed " them from their sins in His 



178 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

own blood. It would be impossible for the unholy 
to enter with their hearts into the praises and em- 
ployments of heaven. 

We have seen that in order to really enjoy the 
ordinances of God's house and to take a delight in 
the duties of the Christian life, man must have his 
heart so changed as that he will have a relish for 
them. Men may, indeed, find an intellectual pleas- 
ure in listening to God's truth. Their tastes may 
be pleased and their emotions aroused in listening 
to the singing of His praise and they may even 
have their interest awakened in the outward pros- 
perity of the Church ; but until hearts have been 
taught the love of God, they cannot find real 
pleasure in the service and worship of God. It 
is love for God and holiness which renders the 
duties of the Christian delightful and joyful. It 
was when his heart had been touched with love 
and gratitude to God that David said, " I love 
the Lord because He hath heard my voice and 
my supplication. Because He hath inclined His 
ear unto me, therefore will I call upon Him as 
long as I live." (Psalm 116:1.) It was when 
his heart was attuned to the praise of God by 
manifestations of love that the worshipper of old 
said, " I was glad when they said unto me ' Let us 
go up into the house of the Lord.' I had rather 
be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than to 
dwell in the tents of wickedness." (Psalm 
84:10.) It was love that moved Paul to work 
SO earnestly, pray so fervently, and make such 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 179 

great sacrifices in order to spread the gospel far 
and near in his day. And it is love that has 
prompted all of God's people since Paul's day to 
work and worship, to preach and pray, to serve 
and make sacrifices that the kingdom of God 
might come and that His will might be done on 
earth as it is in heaven. Now if this new love and 
life in the soul be necessary to delight in the serv- 
ice of God on earth, much more will it be neces- 
sary for the duties and pleasures of heaven. 
There all of the duties in which they engage and 
all of the pleasures in which they are to partici- 
pate are to be perfectly holy. Unless, therefore, 
they possess the inward holy disposition, they 
cannot enter with delight upon the duties and 
pleasures of heaven. Should men with hearts at 
enmity with God and yet in love with sin be 
permitted to enter heaven and stand before the 
God of holiness, they could not find joy and 
happiness there. They would be in the immedi- 
ate presence of a God who could see at a glance 
all of the moral deformity of their souls, and see- 
ing, could but condemn. They would stand face 
to face with God, the Judge of the quick and the 
dead, and must dread the pronouncing of their 
doom. Like our first parents, when they sinned 
and when God called them to account, they would 
seek to hide themselves from God. Or like the 
wicked at the judgment of the great day, they 
would call upon the rocks and the mountains to 
fall upon them and hide them from the wrath of 



180 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the Lamb and from the face of Him that sitteth 
upon the throne. Till man's sinful heart be 
changed, there can be no peace and happiness for 
him in the presence of the God of holiness and 
justice and truth. Till man's soul be renewed, 
he can neither enjoy the spiritual blessings of this 
life nor of that which is to come. 

If it should be thought that if only a man could 
escape the penalty of sin, he would be willing to 
go to heaven with heart unchanged, and tolerate 
the holy worship and service which he could not 
enjoy, even that hope is shut out by the plain 
and emphatic declarations of the Word of God. 
It is written : " Except a man be born again he 
cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3.) 
It is written : " To be carnally minded is death." 
(Romans 6:6.) It is written " There shall in no 
wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither 
whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie: 
but they which are written in the Lamb's book of 
life." (Revelations 21:27.) It is written: 
" Follow holiness — without which no man shall 
see the Lord." (Hebrews 12:14.) Could lan- 
guage be plainer, stronger or more positive and 
explicit? God, who alone has the right to lay 
down the terms and qualifications for membership 
in His kingdom, has declared over and over again 
that man's heart must be changed and his nature 
renewed before he can enter His kingdom. All 
who fail to seek and secure this change through 
the only plan God has ever revealed must not be 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 181 

surprised if at last they find the door of mercy 
shut in their face, for God plainly and faithfully 
warned them of the danger and lovingly invited 
them to the pardon and cleansing provided in the 
gospel. " How shall we escape if we neglect so 
great salvation? " 

The agent of this great change is the Holy 
Spirit. " It is the Spirit that quickeneth." 
(John 3 : 5.,) " Which were born not of blood, 
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, 
but of God." (John 1 : 13.) " Not by works of 
righteousness which we have done, but according 
to His mercy He saved us, by the washing of re- 
generation and renewing of the Holy Ghost ; 
which He shed upon us abundantly through Jesus 
Christ our Savior." (Titus 3:5.) The same al- 
mighty Spirit by which our spirits were created, 
recreates them in righteousness and true holiness. 
He it is who restores to our souls the image of 
God. He it is through whose power we are born 
into the family of God. The instrument which 
He uses in bringing about this change is the truth 
as contained in the Word of God. " The sword 
of the Spirit which is the Word of God." 
(Ephesians 6: 17.) " Being born, not of the cor- 
ruptible seed, but of the incorruptible, by the 
Word of God which liveth and abideth forever." 
(I Peter 1 : 23.) This word is suited to the mind 
and heart and will of man so that when it is 
brought in contact with the soul and energized 
and blessed by the Spirit, it enlightens the mind, 



182 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

purifies the heart and transforms the will. This, 
then, is the instrument which the Spirit uses in 
effecting that mighty change in the nature of 
man by which he passes from death unto life and 
by which his moral likeness to God is restored. 

Let us, then, recognize the necessity for this 
change in the soul in order to qualify it for mem- 
bership in the kingdom of God. Let us acknowl- 
edge our dependence upon God's Spirit to work 
this change. Let each one pray like David, 
" Create in me a clean heart and renew within me 
a right spirit, O God." Let each pray like blind 
Bartemus, " Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy 
upon me." Or like Peter, " Lord, save us ; we 
perish." (Matthew 8 : 25.) 

It is sometimes said that if you convince men 
that they cannot save themselves, they will fold 
their hands in despair and give up all hope and 
effort for salvation, but this is not true to nature. 
Let a man in a burning building feel that there is 
yet a way of escape by some stairway through 
which he can reach a place of safety, and he will 
not seek outside aid, but will continue to collect 
his valuables and depend upon his own efforts 
for escape. But you let him know that the very 
last stairway has been burned away and he will 
cry for outside assistance, " Help ! Help ! Save 
me, or I perish ! " 

Let us learn to use the means and trust to 
God's blessing. The means are principally two 
— reading and hearing the Word, and prayer. 



THE CHANGE OF HEART 18B 

Read the Word and hear the Word and study the 
Word that you may learn the will of God: and 
then pray, earnestly, perseveringly and believ- 
ingly for the power and influence of the Holy 
Ghost. Plead the promise, " If ye, then, being 
evil, know how to give good gifts to your chil- 
dren, how much more shall your heavenly Father 
give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him." 
(Luke 11:13.) This essential change in your 
moral nature wrought by the power of the Holy 
Spirit can be had for the asking. Pray, then, 
earnestly and importunately until Christ be 
formed in you, the hope of glory. 



CHAPTER XVI 
EVIDENCES OF A CHANGE OF HEART 

While it is important to know that God hath 
given to us a divine revelation, it is no less im- 
portant that we be sure that we have accepted 
that revelation as the rule of our lives. While it 
should rejoice our hearts to know that a plan of 
salvation has been made known, it should prove 
a source of greater joy to be sure that we have 
been made partakers of its privileges and bless- 
ings. While we should rejoice in the fact that 
Christ came into the world to seek and save the 
lost, yet we may be permitted to rejoice with a 
greater degree of joy that Christ hath become 
our personal Lord and Redeemer, that we have 
received and rested on Christ alone for salvation 
as offered to us in the gospel. Such an assur- 
ance is within the reach of each believer. For 
this purpose the apostle John declares he wrote 
unto them that believe on His name, " that ye may 
know that ye have eternal life." (John 5: 13.) 

Having considered the evidence in favor of 
Christianity as revealed in the Bible, we are now 
to pass in review the evidence of our acceptance 
of Christ and the truth revealed through Him. 

184 



EVIDENCES OF A CHANGE 185 

We are to seek to answer such questions as these : 
How may we know tiiat we are Christians? 
How may we be sure that we have passed from 
death unto life, that we have become the children 
of God and heirs with Christ of the privileges 
and blessings of the redeemed? 

The importance of this question cannot be over- 
estimated. It is a question of the foundation of 
our hopes of eternal life. It is a question of 
the way from earth to heaven. It is a question of 
the only ark of safety for our souls. It is a 
question of our title to the inheritance that is 
incorruptible, undefiled and that fadeth not away. 
It is a question of our pardon and acceptance 
with God; of our adoption into His family and 
of our renewal by the Holy Spirit, and of our 
hope of dwelling with Him in heaven. If men 
are careful to examine the foundations on which 
they build, the roads which they travel, the vessels 
in which they embark and the titles to their 
earthly possessions, then surely we should exercise 
more than ordinary care to make sure that our 
hopes rest on the Rock of Ages, that our feet 
are walking in the way to heaven, that we are 
in the ark of safety and that we have clear and 
undisputed titles to the heavenly inheritance. 
The Bible teaches us that we may come to pos- 
sess a comfortable assurance that we are members 
of the household of faith and that, through Christ, 
we have life eternal. In this Book are laid down 
certain tests by which each professing Christian 



186 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

may ascertain whether he be in the faith, and 
determine whether he has a well grounded hope 
of being found among the redeemed at the final 
day of trial. 

What, then, are the evidences of our being in 
a state of grace? How may we know that God 
hath begun in us the good work which He is 
pledged to carry on till the day of Jesus Christ? 
This may be decided by the soul's new view of 
sin. Before conversion a man has low views of 
sin and is disposed to flatter himself that he is not 
so wicked in God's sight as others. He over- 
looks, conceals, and underrates his sin. He finds 
real delight in some of his sins and has little 
thought of giving them up, at least for the pres- 
ent. He seeks to excuse them and to find grounds 
of justification for them. But when he comes to 
know God and to view sin as God regards it, like 
Job he " abhors himself and repents in dust and 
ashes." He comes then to see sin in its true col- 
ors. He sees it in all of its hideousness and de- 
formity, in all of its baseness and vileness. He 
learns to hate it not only because it brings the 
penalty of death upon those who commit it, but 
also because it offends God and degrades man. 
Such is his sense of the vileness of sin that he 
hates it and grieves over it and turns away from 
it unto God. He regards it very much as a man 
would regard a poisonous serpent that has bitten 
him. He hates and dreads it and turns to the 
great Physician who alone can heal him. He 



EVIDENCES OF A CHANGE 187 

looks to the cross and sees that it required the 
death and suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ to 
atone for it and that only through the mercy of 
God in Christ can it be pardoned and cleansed 
away. Hence he turns from sin back to the very 
God against whom the sin was committed, looking 
for pardon and acceptance through the merit of 
Christ, the Savior of sinners. Like Peter, he 
weeps bitterly over his sin and turns back to Jesus 
the Savior from sin. Like the prodigal, he comes 
to himself and says, " I will arise and go to my 
father and say, ' Father I have sinned against 
Heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy 
to be called thy son.' " He exercises the grace 
of repentance which sprang up in his heart under 
the influence of the Spirit which Christ hath sent 
into his heart. Such repentance is not the exer- 
cise of an unregenerate heart, but is an evidence 
that a divine power hath been working there. 
" Him hath God exalted to be a Prince and a Sav- 
ior, to give repentance unto Israel." If we are 
conscious that we sorrow for our sins, that we hate 
and abhor them, and that we forsake them and 
turn from them unto God, we have evidence that 
we are Christians. Our soul's view of sin has un- 
dergone such a change that it could have been 
wrought in our hearts only by divine agency. 
The current of our feelings has been so changed 
that it flows in a direction just the opposite from 
that in which it once flowed. We have come to 
hate what we once loved and to love that which 



188 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

we once hated. We have passed from death unto 
life. We have been created anew in Christ Jesus. 
" Old things have passed away and all things 
have become new." 

We may also judge as to our spiritual state 
by the souVs view of Christ. While the mind of 
the unconverted man may become convinced of 
the truth of Christ and Christianity, it will not 
see and accept Christ as a Savior from sin. The 
prophet Isaiah gives the true account of the esti- 
mate put upon Christ by the natural man when 
he writes, " He hath no form nor comeliness ; and 
when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we 
should desire Him. He is despised and rejected 
of men " — and " we hid, as it were, our faces 
from Him." But when we have exercised living 
faith, Christ appears to us in a far different light. 
" Unto you that believe He is precious." By the 
eye of faith we are enabled to see the beauty and 
perfection of Christ's character and to estimate 
aright the value of His work in our behalf. We 
can then see how He combined in His person all 
of the perfections of God and all of the virtues 
of unfallen man. We see in Him infinite power 
to protect us against all of our enemies, infinite 
wisdom to guide us in all of our perplexities, in- 
finite mercy to forgive all of our sins, and in- 
finite faithfulness and tenderness blended with 
human sympathy and love to enable Him to sym- 
pathize with us and to prompt Him to bear pa- 
tiently with us in all of our weakness and infirmity. 



EVIDENCES OF A CHANGE 189 

We see in Him the very Prophet we need to teach 
us the way to heaven, the very Priest we need to 
atone for our sins and to plead our cause in the 
courts of heaven, and the very King we need to 
rescue us from the dominion of sin and Satan, and 
to translate us into the light and liberty of the 
sons of God. Faith sees in Christ the very Savior 
needed to rescue from guilt and sin and everlast- 
ing death, and so receives and rests on Him alone 
for salvation as He is offered in the gospel. " By 
grace are ye saved, through faith ; and that not of 
yourselves ; it is the gift of God." When, there- 
fore, we are conscious that we do trust in Christ 
alone for salvation, we may be sure that God hath 
given us this faith and enabled us to see Christ 
as a suitable Savior and to put our trust in Him 
as the only Savior whom God hath provided. If 
we have put our trust in Him, we have the assur- 
ance of God that we are possessors of eternal life. 
" He that believeth on me hath everlasting life 
and I will raise him up at the last day." 

Again, our changed feelings as to God and to 
His People, His Word, His House, and His Wor- 
ship will serve as a test of our spiritual state. 
Whereas there was once enmity in the carnal mind 
and heart against God, there is now in the heart of 
the child of God a true and genuine love for Him. 
If we love God, then we are united to Him in the 
bonds of covenant grace. " He that dwelleth in 
love dwelleth in God and God in him " and " Every 
one that loveth is bom of God." (I John 4: 16, 



190 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

and I John 4:7.) If, then, there be any true 
and genuine love in our hearts for God we may 
rest assured that it was begotten there by the 
power of God. " We love Him because He first 
loved us." Then if we love God, we will love His 
people; and if we love His people, we have an addi- 
tional evidence that we are His children, for it is 
written : " By this we know that we have passed 
from death unto life, because we love the breth- 
ren." (I John 3:14.) To this we shall be 
prompted by the Spirit. We shall see the image 
of God in others and love them for His sake, and 
we shall recognize them as God's children and so 
feel drawn to them as members of the same spirit- 
ual household. If we love God, we will love His 
Word. It is a revelation of His will and charac- 
ter. It tells us of His love in the gift of His Son, 
of the plan of salvation, of the home He is pre- 
paring for His people. Those who love God will 
likewise love His House. It is here that God meets 
with His people and bestows upon them rich bless- 
ings of His grace. It is here that they meet and 
hold communion with His people and it is here that 
they worship before His holy throne in prayer 
and praise and thanksgiving. It is here they 
study His Word and receive His sacraments, the 
seals of His covenant, and it is here that they 
bring their offerings for the extension of the glori- 
ous kingdom of which they are members. 

The fruits of the Spirit in our lives and char- 



EVIDENCES OF A CHANGE 191 

acters is still another evidence of the presence of 
spiritual life in our hearts. As we know the char- 
acter of the tree by the kind of fruit it bears, so 
may we know the character of the man. The kind 
of fruit which the Christian should bear is clearly 
indicated in the Word. " The fruit of the Spirit 
is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, good- 
ness, faith, temperance, meekness. Against such 
there is no law." " If these be in you and abound, 
they make you to be that ye shall not be barren 
and unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus 
Christ." (II Peter 1:8.) To know Jesus Christ 
is to have eternal life. 

To crown all other evidences of a renewed heart 
will be given the witness of the Spirit. God no 
longer speaks in audible tones to teach us truth 
and duty, but by His Spirit, through His Word 
and through our faculties, He enlightens, purifies 
and heals. He sheds abroad in our hearts His 
love and imparts to us a filial spirit whereby we 
cry " Abba," Father. We own God as our Father 
and He claims us as His dear children. 

If we find that we are Christians, let us rejoice 
and be glad and seek more and more to walk 
worthy of Him who was holy, harmless, undefiled 
and separate from sinners, and who " went about 
doing good." 

If we find that we have no hope in Jesus, let us 
seek and find Him before it be too late. He is the 
pnly " way " that leads to God, the only " truth " 



192 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that makes wise unto salvation, and the only 
" life " that giveth eternal life. " Seek the Lord 
while He may be found, call upon Him while He is 



CHAPTER XVII 
REPENTANCE 

Before the gospel was clearly revealed to the 
world, God bore patiently with the sins of men and 
in a certain sense overlooked their transgressions. 
But when the gospel had been published and pro- 
claimed, He commanded all men everywhere to re- 
pent and turn to Him as the only being worthy 
of worship. " The times of this ignorance God 
winked at; but now commandeth all men every- 
where to repent." This command comes to us with 
all of the force with which it came to those to 
whom Paul preached at Athens. 

To obey this command it is necessary that we 
understand its full meaning. The literal meaning 
of the word here translated " repentance " is a 
change of mind with special reference to sin. It 
is the result of the enlightening, renewing influence 
of the Holy Spirit upon the soul. It is God's pre- 
cious gift to man through His Son Jesus Christ 
whom He hath exalted " to give repentance unto 
man and forgiveness of sins." It has been well 
defined to be " a saving grace whereby a sinner 
out of a true sense of his sin and an apprehension 

of the mercy of God in Christ Jesus doth, with 
193 



194 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

grief and hatred of his sin, turn from it unto God 
with full purpose of and endeavor after new obe- 
dience." (C. Q. 87.) 

With this definition in mind you will note that 
the change of mind involved in repentance mani- 
fests itself in a true sense of sin felt by the soul. 
In his natural, unrenewed condition, man has not 
that impression of the nature and enormity of sin 
that he should have. He regards it altogether too 
lightly. He thinks and speaks of it lightly. He 
acts as though it were a trivial matter and commits 
it with little reference to the account which he must 
at last render unto God for its commission. He 
sometimes shows his folly by making a mock of sin 
and by committing it with reckless disregard as to 
its consequences. If he be occasionally disturbed 
and alarmed by the warnings of conscience, this 
is not because he hates sin, but because he dreads 
its penalty. As one of the older writers puts it: 
" It is not sin but hell he hates." But when the 
Holy Spirit enlightens his understanding and re- 
news his nature, man comes to look upon sin from 
a different standpoint. He then sees it in its real 
deformity and terrible hideousness. He comes to 
feel it to be an evil and bitter thing to sin against 
God. He sees how it defies the authority of God, 
violates His holy law and abuses His love and 
mercy as revealed in Christ Jesus. He has a new 
and a true sense of sin because he has been so en- 
lightened as to be able to see and estimate the 
character and influence of sin. Such a view would 



REPENTANCE 195 

lead him to despair but for the fact that he has 
been brought to an apprehension of the mercy of 
God in Christ Jesus. You may see the contrast 
between the effect of sin in one who has never 
caught a view of the mercy of God in Christ and 
the effect on one who hath seen this vision, in the 
cases of Judas and Peter. Judas had a deep sense 
of the guilt and danger of sin without a glimpse 
of the infinite mercy of God, and so keen were the 
stings of remorse that he sought refuge in the grave 
of a suicide. He went and hung himself and went 
to his own place. Peter, on the other hand, had 
both a deep sense of sin and a clear view of the 
mercy of God, and therefore his heart was over- 
whelmed with sorrow and yet melted to tenderness 
and moved to trust. Hence he went out and wept 
bitterly ; but when Christ sought to arouse his faith 
and love by that searching question, " Simon, son 
of Jonas, lovest thou Me? " he responded in hum- 
ble faith and confession : " Lord, Thou knowest 
all things ; Thou knowest that I love Thee." So 
must every penitent sinner feel when he remembers 
his sinfulness and unworthiness — he must weep 
bitterly. So must everyone act who remembers the 
mercy of God in Christ Jesus — he must confess 
his unworthiness but still trust in Christ as the 
only hope of lost sinners. 

Another evidence of the change involved in re- 
pentance will be grief for sin. Though the sinner 
may have the clearest view of the mercy of God 
and the surest ground of pardon and acceptance 



196 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

through the merit of Christ, yet he will still grieve 
over the fact that he has sinned against the good- 
ness and mercy of a tender heavenly Father and 
helped to cause the suffering and sorrow of the 
Savior. Just as a child will sorrow for the wrong 
he has done to a kind father or mother, even 
though assured that the offense has been forgiven 
and the punishment remitted, so the child of God 
will grieve over his sins, though they have been 
pardoned and he assured of his acceptance before 
God. This was the experience of David. Though 
God had forgiven him and restored to him His 
Spirit, yet he says : " My sin is ever before me." 
" Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation and 
uphold me with Thy free Spirit." He could not 
forget his sin though it had been pardoned, and 
could not have that joy he had once known though 
he knew that God had been reconciled unto him. 
So the thought of the sins which he had committed 
will be a source of sorrow to every true penitent, 
however clear he may be able to read his title to 
mansions in the sky. 

Along with this grief for sin there will be a true 
and genuine hatred of sin. The man who has been 
bitten by a serpent hates it because it injected 
poison into his system ; so the man who has been 
stained and polluted by the presence of sin will 
hate that sin with all of his soul. Paul was no 
stranger to the war that was being carried on 
within his soul between the forces of good and evil, 
between the old and the new man, between the 



REPENTANCE 197 

principles of sin and holiness. In his distress by 
reason of this conflict he cried out : " O wretched 
man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body 
of this death? " Then he looks to Christ and by 
faith sees the victory and exclaims : " I thank 
God through Jesus Christ our Lord." 

Not only will the penitent be filled with grief 
and hatred of sin, but these will lead him to turn 
from his sin to God. He will hear and obey the 
voice of God as He says, " Let the wicked forsake 
his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and 
let him return unto the Lord and He will have 
mercy upon him, and unto our God for He will 
abundantly pardon." He will turn from his worst 
enemy to his best friend, from sin to holiness, from 
Satan to God. Like the prodigal he will say : " I 
will arise and go to my father and say unto him, 
6 I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight and 
am no more worthy to be called thy son,' " and 
like the prodigal he will arise and come to his 
Father and make the confession he had promised 
he would make. 

Such will be the purpose of his heart and such 
the endeavor of his will that the result will be a 
" new obedience," new in motive, new in its rule 
and new in degree — the obedience of a new heart 
earnestly seeking to serve and glorify its Lord 
and Redeemer. Heretofore the fear of punishment 
may have restrained from sin, now the love of 
Christ constrains the heart of the penitent not to 
live unto himself but unto Christ who died and rose 



198 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

again for his justification. " The goodness of God 
leads him to repentance." Such repentance will 
bear fruit in the daily life, leading men not only 
away from that which is evil, but towards that 
which is holy and just and good. Such repentance 
God will bestow upon all who confess their sins and 
look for mercy through Jesus Christ. 

As God stands ready to grant this grace, so 
should man be ready to exercise it in his daily life. 
This he should do because God commands it. His 
right to issue such a command none can gainsay. 
He has this right by creation, for it was by His 
wisdom and power that all men were made. 
" Have we not all one Father, hath not one God 
created us ? " Yea, " He is the father of our spir- 
its and the framer of our bodies." He has this 
right by preservation, for •* in Him we live and 
move and have our being." He has this right by 
redemption, for He alone hath the power and wis- 
dom to form a plan by which we can be pardoned 
and saved, and He only has the right to deter- 
mine the terms on which sinners may be received 
back into His favor; and He hath declared that 
except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. He 
has the right because He only can give the power 
and the grace to enable man to obey the command. 
It would have been mockery for anyone save the 
divine Savior to have commanded the man with the 
withered hand to stretch it forth, but since along 
with His command there could and did go forth 
the power enabling the man to obey, it was a com- 



REPENTANCE 199 

mand of love and mercy which restored the man's 
hand whole like the other. So will it be with the 
command to repent. God will give the ability 
and willingness to repent, and the sinner will be 
restored to his Father's home and have given unto 
him a right and title to the blessings which he had 
forfeited by his sin. Hence it is that God sends 
out this royal proclamation to men everywhere to 
repent and turn to God for salvation. 

Another reason why you should turn back to 
God in true repentance is found in the fact that 
sin leads to ruin. It leads away from God, the 
source of ail good. It leads away from light and 
holiness into darkness and spiritual death. " Sin, 
when it is finished, bringeth forth death." Who 
can measure all of the meaning wrapped up in that 
terrible word death? It means separation from 
the love and favor of God, which we call spiritual 
death. It means separation of the soul from the 
body, which we call physical death. It means final 
and eternal separation from the love and favor of 
God, which we call eternal death. It means the 
infliction of all of the penalty due to sin — all of 
the sorrow and remorse and suffering which shall 
be known in the other world, which we call the sec- 
ond death. It is towards all of this evil the soul is 
tending when it is going in the way of sin. As, 
therefore, a man loves his own soul, he should turn 
from his evil ways that he may live. 

On the other hand, repentance leads to salvation 
and to all of the blessings which are included in 



200 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that term. It leads to Him who will pardon and 
forgive all of his sins. It will lead to Him who 
can cleanse him from his sins. It leads into the 
family of God and into the possession of all of the 
rights and privileges of the children of the King 
of Kings and Lord of Lords. It leads in the way 
of peace and joy and happiness. It leads safely 
through the valley of the shadow of death up to 
" the presence of God, where there is fulness of 
joy, and to His right hand, where there are pleas- 
ures forevermore." 

Then, again, the welfare of others should cause 
you to repent. Sin cannot be confined in its effects 
and influence to the person who commits it. Like 
an inherited disease its taint is transmitted from 
father to son, and like a contagious disease it 
spreads to those who come in contact with it. The 
man, therefore, who continues to commit sin does 
so not only in opposition to his own best interests, 
but in disregard to the welfare of his children and 
neighbors. No one but God can reckon the far- 
reaching influence of a single sin. Who, then, but 
God can measure the sum of all of the evil influ- 
ences set in operation by a life of sin in the 
world? "Stand in awe and sin not." "Fools 
make a mock at sin." As you would shield your 
children and neighbors from the contagion of sin, 
hate it, avoid it. Turn from it unto God. 

Gratitude, too, should prompt you to look unto 
God for salvation from sin. God, at a great cost, 
has provided for you a great redemption. Infinite 



REPENTANCE 201 

love hath spread for you the great gospel feast 
and the invitation hath been sent to you, bidding 
you come and enjoy its privileges and blessings. 
Will you not accept that invitation ? A way of es- 
cape from sin and all of its evils has been effected 
by the love and sacrifices of the Savior. Will 
you not escape by that way? To fail to do so 
would be to become guilty of base ingratitude to 
the God of all mercy and to the Savior of lost sin- 
ners. 

The longer you delay repentance, the more diffi- 
cult will be your return to God. The farther 
away you go from God and holiness, the longer 
the way back. The longer you indulge in sin, 
the stronger becomes the habit of sin and the 
weaker to resist its power you become. The 
longer you live out of Christ, the greater the dan- 
ger that you will never flee for refuge to lay hold 
upon the hope set before you in the gospel. The 
longer you trifle with the offers of mercy and 
with the wooings of the Spirit, the greater the 
danger that you may reach the limit of God's 
forbearance and die in your sins without God and 
without hope. " How shall we escape if we neg- 
lect so great salvation? " 

Then remember that we must all appear before 
the judgment seat of Christ to render an account 
of the deeds done in the body. " God hath ap- 
pointed a day in the which He will judge the world 
in righteousness by that man whom He hath or- 
dained." Then an account must be given, not 



202 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

only of every secret thing whether it be good or 
evil, but also of all of the opportunities we have 
had and slighted, of all of the invitations we have 
rejected, of all of the warnings we have disre- 
garded and of all of the good influences we have 
resisted. Then must we answer for all of our fail- 
ures to do the good we might have done and for 
all of the evil influences we have wielded over oth- 
ers. They will meet us there and serve as wit- 
nesses against us in that final day of trial. Who 
then will be our friend and advocate unless we 
repent of our sins and turn to Christ for salva- 
tion? Repent now and believe the gospel before 
it is too late ! 



CHAPTER XVIII 
FAITH 

The question which springs up in the mind of 
everyone who becomes interested in his spiritual 
welfare is this: How can I enter into the enjoy- 
ment of the blessings of salvation? How can I 
secure the pardon of my sins and enjoy the love 
and favor of God? How can I be delivered from 
the power and pollution of sin and have restored 
to my soul the image of God? How can I secure 
a title to heaven and to all of its blessings and 
joys, its honors and rewards? Since Christ has 
come to be the savior of sinners and since I am a 
sinner, how may I obtain an interest in His re- 
demption? " What must I do to be saved? " 

This is the question of all others most impor- 
tant to the penitent soul. This is a question 
which the wisest philosophers of earth have never 
been able to answer; a question for an answer to 
which the angels of heaven made diligent inquiry ; 
a question that involves in its solution the destiny 
of the entire race of man ; a question that required 
the wisdom of the Godhead to solve. The answer 
was given when Christ said, in answer to the ques- 
tion, " Who will go and whom shall we send? " 
203 



#04 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

" Lo, I come ; in the volume of the book it is writ- 
ten of Me, I delight to do Thy will, O God. " 
The answer was given when the angel announced 
the birth of one who should save His people from 
their sins : " Behold I bring you good tidings of 
great joy which shall be unto all people; for unto 
you is born this day in the city of David a Savior 
which is Christ the Lord." The answer was given 
more directly when Paul said to the jailer: " Be- 
lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ and Thou shalt 
be saved." If we can understand this answer, 
then we shall have clear and correct views as to 
the way of life and the plan of salvation. This 
answer implies that, by reason of his sin, man is 
lost — is condemned and defiled by sin and liable 
to all of the penalty involved in the threat of 
death to those who disobeyed the command of God. 
It implies that Christ and Christ alone is able 
and willing to deliver man from that condition of 
sin and misery, and bring him into a state of 
pardon and acceptance before God. And it fur- 
ther implies that, in order to this rescue and in 
order to the enjoyment of the blessings of salva- 
tion, faith must be exercised on the Lord Jesus 
Christ. It is to this last statement that attention 
is to be mainly directed in this chapter. 

That man is sinful and lost and that Christ is 
a Savior able and willing to save from sin has al- 
ready been shown. It has been shown that these 
statements are taught most clearly in the Word 
of God and that they are pretty generally ac- 



FAITH 205 

cepted as true among men. It is true that men 
do not have that deep sense of the greatness and 
guilt of sin which they should have and that they 
have not that high estimate of the worth and 
worthiness of Christ and of the absolute necessity 
of His work that they should. Still most men 
in Christian lands do admit that they are sin- 
ners and that they need a Savior and that Christ 
is the very Savior they need. But many of these 
are not ready to receive and act upon the third 
truth implied in this answer to the question, 
"What must I do to be saved?" viz. that faith 
must be exercised before sin can be escaped and 
the blessings of salvation enjoyed. 

To know that you are lost and that Christ is a 
Savior will not profit unless He be accepted and 
trusted as a Savior able and willing to pardon 
and cleanse and save by virtue of what He did 
and suffered in the sinner's stead. You must 
" believe on the Lord Jesus Christ " in order to 
be saved. 

What, then, is it to have faith or to believe on 
the Lord Jesus Christ? The word faith, in its 
most general sense, has been defined as " assent to 
truth upon the presentation of appropriate evi- 
dence." For example, let it be stated that a bat- 
tle took place at a certain time and place. At 
first the report may not be credited, but let suffi- 
cient and appropriate evidence be furnished — 
let a courier come from the field of battle bearing 
a dispatch from the commanding general stating 



206 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that the battle had been fought, and let the char- 
acter of the witness be reliable — and the news 
will be received as true because sufficient and ap- 
propriate evidence has been presented. Faith is 
reposed in, assent is given to, the statement be- 
cause it is accompanied with convincing evidence. 
It is evident that this faith in its effect and in- 
fluence will vary according to the evidence pre- 
sented and according to the nature of that about 
which the testimony is given. If the truth at- 
tested be some fact or law in the physical world, 
while we may give our full assent to its truth, it 
will not move our moral nature. We may be led 
to believe, on good and sufficient evidence, that all 
bodies gravitate toward the centre of the earth 
and feel no emotion of joy or sorrow. But let it 
be certified to us that an innocent child hath been 
beaten or murdered, and at once every right-think- 
ing man will feel that gross wrong hath been 
done and that the criminal should be punished. 
Our moral nature is here brought into active ex- 
ercise. If the witness be reliable and the evidence 
clear and positive, then our conviction of the 
thing asserted will be complete. In the realm of 
religion it is God — speaking in His Word — 
whom you are to believe touching all that He 
teaches you concerning your ruin in Adam and 
your salvation through Christ. Some, indeed, 
have supposed that faith is only rational assent 
to the truth of the Bible, founded upon appropri- 
ate evidence. They view through the testimony 



FAITH 207 

of others the miracles which were wrought in at- 
testation of the claims of those who came to re- 
veal the will of God, and conclude that the Book 
must be from God. They study the wonderful 
predictions recorded in the Bible and their re- 
markable fulfillment recorded in history, and see 
how perfect and complete is the fulfillment, and 
confess that this Book could not have been the 
product of human ingenuity. They study the 
Book itself and find how consistent it is in all of 
its parts, how accurate in all of its statements of 
the history and customs of the people mentioned, 
and how sublime its moral teachings, and how 
completely it describes the sins and the needs of 
the human soul and sets forth the provision God 
hath revealed for meeting and relieving these 
needs, and thence conclude that its writers were 
correct in holding that they " spake as they were 
moved by the Holy Ghost " — that God spake 
through them to man. Upon these and other evi- 
dences they receive the Bible as true and as from 
God. This they call faith. And it is historical 
faith, but it is not saving faith. Hundreds of 
persons have believed all of this and yet remained 
" in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of in- 
iquity." The devils are said to " believe and 
tremble." They doubtless believe with the intel- 
lect every truth God hath revealed to them, and 
yet they hate God and do all in their power 
against His kingdom and against Christ, His 
anointed Son. There must be more than a mere 



208 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

intellectual assent to the truth revealed in the 
Bible. There must be an affectionate receiving 
of Christ as He is revealed to us in the gospel. 
The entire soul believes and trusts in Him as the 
Savior of sinners. The mind sees Him to be the 
truth ; the heart fastens its affections on Him as 
one worthy of its love and confidence; and the 
will trusts in His person and work for salvation. 
Hence faith has been well defined as " a saving 
grace whereby we receive and rest upon Christ 
alone for salvation as He is offered to us in the 
gospel." The soul receives Christ as a Savior and 
rests upon His word and work alone for salvation. 
It depends upon His suffering, obedience, death 
and resurrection as its only hope of pardon and 
acceptance before God. It is the soul's receiving 
Christ and looking for salvation only for the sake 
of what Christ is and has done for its salvation. 
It has been well said that such faith is the " hinge 
on which our salvation turns, that it is the eye 
that looks to Christ, the foot that goes to Him 
and the Hand that receives Him." Faith is made 
up of two elements — confidence and trust. We 
must be thoroughly convinced that Christ is every 
way worthy of our confidence — that He is both 
able and willing to pardon and save; that He 
loved us and gave Himself for us ; that He suf- 
fered and died, the just for the unjust, that He 
might bring us to God; that He did and suffered 
all that God required in order to our salvation; 
and that He gained the victory over all of our 



FAITH 209 

spiritual enemies ; that He rose from the grave 
and that He ascended to heaven, there to inter- 
cede in our behalf; that for His sake God will 
freely and fully pardon and save all who accept 
Him as their Savior; that if we thus receive and 
depend upon Him for salvation, God will save us. 
This describes the first element of faith — your 
confidence that He can and will do all He promises 
in order to your salvation. 

But we are not only to believe that Christ will 
save us if we accept Him ; we must actually receive 
and trust Him for salvation. We must exercise 
our faith in Him by trusting in Him for salva- 
tion. You might know a man of such integrity 
of character and such skill in business that you 
would be willing to place in his care and keeping 
your most valuable worldly possession — - your 
gold and silver, your name and children; that 
would be one element of your faith in such a man. 
Then you might have occasion to exercise that 
faith by actually entrusting to his keeping such 
possessions. So we must not only believe that 
Christ is able and willing to save us, but we must 
actually receive and rest upon Him alone for sal- 
vation as He is offered to us in the gospel. There 
we find Him offered to us as a prophet to show 
us the way of life. We must humbly consent to 
be led and taught and guided by Him. He is 
presented to us as the only priest who can lay 
upon God's altar a sacrifice sufficient to atone for 
our sins and to plead our cause before His Father 



210 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

in heaven. We must confess to Him our sins and 
ask Him to plead in our behalf the merit of His 
own suffering and death. He is revealed to us as 
our King to command and to protect us. We 
must submit to His authority and place ourselves 
under His care and keeping, and trust in Him 
to give us the final victory over all of our spirit- 
ual enemies and to bring us at last into His king- 
dom of glory in heaven. He is made known to us 
for the purpose of saving us from the guilt and 
power and pollution of sin. We must take Him 
to be our Savior that He may work this salvation 
for and in us so that at last we may be satisfied 
when we awake with His likeness. 

Christ, then, is the direct object of our faith, 
and salvation from sin the great blessing which 
we are to receive through Him. It is true we are 
to receive and confide in the entire revelation 
which God hath made in His Word, but the more 
immediate and specific object of our faith is the 
Lord Jesus Christ. It is only through Him that 
salvation comes to sinners, for . it is written, 
" Other foundation can no man lay than that 
which is laid, which is Christ Jesus." And " No 
man cometh unto the Father but by Me." " He 
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: 
and he that believeth not the Son, shall not see 
life; but the wrath of God abideth upon him." 
(John 3 : 36.) " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ 
and thou shalt be saved." 

The result of believing on Christ will be salva- 



FAITH 211 

tion in its broadest, richest and fullest meaning. 
We can never know the full value of salvation ex- 
cept as we are made to see and feel the evil and 
danger of sin. It was by sin that we lost com- 
munion with God. While man bore God's like- 
ness there was perfect harmony between God and 
man, but when he sinned he sought to hide himself 
from God and God banished him from His pres- 
ence that he might be made to feel the evil of 
having departed from the living God, the source of 
all good and happiness. Through the salvation 
brought by Christ we who were afar off, " with- 
out God and without hope in the world," are 
made nigh by the blood of the everlasting cov- 
enant. We who were strangers are made fellow- 
citizens in the kingdom of God. We who were 
thirsty are led back to the fountains of living wa- 
ters that flow from the throne of God. We who 
had wandered from the fold are sought and found 
by the good Shepherd and brought back to the 
fold. We who had been alienated from God by 
sin are rescued and restored to communion with 
Him through Jesus Christ our Lord. Not only 
did man lose communion with God but his heart 
became defiled by sin; his mind was henceforth 
blinded to the beauty of holiness, and his will per- 
verted into habits of sin and wickedness. With- 
out divine aid he can never hope to bear the image 
of God which was lost in the fall. It was to ac- 
complish man's deliverance from sin and his res- 
toration to holiness that Christ came. " This is 



212 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation 
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sin- 
ners." " Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for He 
shall save His people from their sins." Salvation 
restores holiness to the soul of man and thus 
brings him back into harmony with God. The 
evils which accompany man in his sinful condition 
are manifold. The wrath of God abides upon 
him. The guilt of sin goes with him wherever he 
goes. The death of sin seizes upon his body and 
soul, manifesting itself in physical pain and sick- 
ness and death and in mental suffering — care, 
sorrow and remorse. And all of these are but 
forerunners of evils far worse which are to over- 
take him in the world to come. From all of these 
Christ comes to rescue man by breaking the fet- 
ters of sin, by destroying the works of the devil 
and by translating man into the glorious light 
and liberty of the sons of God. 

From the loss of communion with God, from 
His wrath and curse, from the guilt and power and 
pollution of sin, from its terrible effects upon 
body, mind and soul, both in this world and in that 
which is to come, we may all find deliverance if we 
will believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Not only 
so, but through Him we shall be brought into all 
of the privileges and blessings of the redeemed in 
heaven. How reasonable, then, the command, 
" Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt 
be saved ! " He is infinitely worthy of your trust, 
fie has all of those qualities which should cqm- 



FAITH 2IS 

mend Him to your love and confidence. He has 
all knowledge, so that He knows perfectly all of 
your needs, all of your sins and of your enemies, 
all of your temptations. He has infinite power 
and resources, so that He can do all that needs 
to be done in order to your salvation. He has 
infinite love and compassion, prompting Him to 
give to you just that which you need to bring you 
back to God and heaven. He is divine so that 
He can represent your cause within the court of 
heaven. He is human so that He can sympathize 
with you in all of your trials and sorrows and 
temptations. He has already atoned for your 
sins, conquered your enemies and entered within 
the holy of holies to plead your cause before His 
Father's throne. He invites your confidence and 
trust, and He deserves your trust and love and 
obedience. 

Then, too, you need just such a Friend and 
Savior. In your ignorance you need His guid- 
ance, in your weakness you need His help, in your 
guilt you need His mercy, and in your lost condi- 
tion you need His salvation. 

If you would not only be saved, but be the 
means of saving your children, your friends and 
your neighbors, you must take Christ to be your 
Savior. You cannot hope to lead others to love 
and trust the Savior unless you are willing to love 
and trust Him yourself. Like Andrew, you must 
first find and trust Jesus yourself and then may 
you hope to lead others to Jesus. 



214 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Then if you do not trust in Christ, there is left 
absolutely no other foundation on which you may 
rest your hope of salvation. " There is none 
other name, under heaven, given among men 
whereby we must be saved, neither is there salva- 
tion in any other." As, therefore, you would es- 
cape the doom of the lost, as you would be the 
means of saving others from spiritual and eternal 
death, as you would have the wants and longings 
of your own soul met and supplied, and as you 
would find some one worthy of your love and con- 
fidence, look to the Lord Jesus Christ and trust in 
Him alone for salvation. " Believe on the Lord 
Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." 



CHAPTER XIX 
WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 

In order to be a Christian, and especially to be 
an efficient Christian, it is important to have a 
clear and distinct knowledge of what it is to be a 
Christian. 

In general terms, a Christian is one who ac- 
cepts the teaching of Christ, trusts in the person 
of Christ, imbibes the spirit of Christ, partakes of 
His grace, and seeks to obey His commands and 
imitate His example. 

It is not wise nor necessary to wait until you 
understand all that Christ taught before becoming 
a Christian, but it is essential that you have a 
knowledge of the plan by which Christ saves from 
sin. You must understand that you were guilty 
and condemned and lost by reason of your sin, 
but that Christ, in love and compassion, took your 
place under the law and did and suffered all that 
was required of you, and that for the sake of His 
work, suffering, death and resurrection, all of 
your sins may be pardoned and you may be re- 
ceived back into the love and favor of God, be 
cleansed from sin and be brought at last into all 

of the blessings and privileges of Heaven. This 
215 



216 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

much must be understood by everyone who hopes 
to be saved. He must at least understand that he 
is a sinner and that Christ is a Savior from sin. 

Then, in order to get the benefit of Christ's 
work, it is necessary that a man accept Christ as 
His Savior, that he receive and rest upon Him 
alone for salvation as He is offered in the gospel. 
Then, too, he must catch the spirit of Christ, and 
experience something of the grace of Christ in 
his soul. Then it will be his earnest desire and 
effort to do the will of Christ and to imitate His 
example. This obedience and this imitation will 
not be perfect, but they will be real and sincere. 
His nature having been renewed by the power of the 
Holy Spirit, he will seek to walk in newness of life 
and to do those things which are pleasing in the 
sight of Him whom his soul loves and adores. 
Hence, growing out of this definition, we may dis- 
cover certain specific elements which go to make 
up every genuine Christian. For one thing, he 
will come to have a real sense of sin and such an 
appreciation of the mercy of God in Christ Jesus 
that he will hate and forsake his sins and flee to 
God for mercy and pardon. God's direction to 
those who would receive His mercy is, " Let the 
wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man 
his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord and 
He will have mercy on him, and to our God, for 
He will abundantly pardon." The message of 
John the Baptist was, " Repent, for the kingdom 
of heaven is at hand " ; and this was the message 



WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 217 

of Christ Himself : " Except ye repent, ye shall 
all likewise perish." (Luke 13:3.) The sinner 
must come to Him with such sorrow for sin and 
such a vision of God's mercy as will both prompt 
and encourage him to turn away from his sins and 
seek pardon and acceptance at the hands of the 
God of all mercy and grace. The man who does 
not thus repent of his sins and look to God for 
mercy has not yet taken the first step in the Chris- 
tian life. 

Again, the Christian is one who trusts in Christ 
alone for salvation. He has found out that he 
can never earn salvation by anything which he 
can do, that he can never atone for his sins which 
have been committed in the past, nor ever keep the 
law perfectly in the future, and that therefore he 
must look outside of himself to some one higher and 
holier and more perfect than himself for salvation. 
When almost in despair lest he may never find a 
way of escape, Christ is revealed to him in the 
gospel as one both able and willing to do for him 
that which he could not do for himself. He sees 
that Christ has obeyed the law perfectly, that He 
has paid its penalty fully, and that pardon is of- 
fered to him through His merit. He reads and 
believes such passages as these : " He died, the 
just for the unjust, that He might bring us to 
God " ; " He that believeth on Me hath everlasting 
life " ; " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
shalt be saved." He believes these assurances, he 
trusts in Christ, to whom they direct him, and 



218 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

finds peace and pardon and salvation. . . . He 
gladly rests his all on the word and promise and 
work and person of Christ the Savior of sinners. 

His change of view as to sin and Christ is the 
direct result of the work of the Holy Spirit. 
" To as many as received Him, to them gave He 
power to become the sons of God, even to them 
that believe on His name which are born not of 
blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of 
man, but of God." (John 1:12-13.) It is by 
the Spirit of God that the sinner is born again, 
quickened and raised up and made to sit in heav- 
enly places in Christ Jesus. His mind is en- 
lightened, his heart changed, his will renewed and 
his whole soul so renovated that henceforth he has 
a new nature, the distinctive feature of which is 
holiness, not perfect but prevalent. 

The soul, thus renewed, will have something of 
the spirit of Christ because the grace of Christ 
has been imparted unto it and the love of Christ 
shed abroad in it under the power and influence 
of the Holy Spirit. Thus he will be influenced 
and constrained not to live unto himself but unto 
Christ who died and rose again for his justifica- 
tion. Hence he will earnestly strive to obey every 
known command of Christ, his new Lord and Mas- 
ter, and will seek to imitate the example of Him 
who came to rescue him from sin and death. 

It has been objected that it is unreasonable to 
expect man to imitate the example of Him who 
was " holy, harmless and undefiled and separate 



WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 219 

from sinners and made higher than the heavens." 
Of course it is not required of the Christian that 
he imitate the example of Christ perfectly, nor 
that he imitate those divine acts by which Christ 
was distinguished as divine. Man cannot be ex- 
pected to exercise divine power nor take to himself 
divine prerogatives. He is not required nor ex- 
pected to perform miracles nor to pardon sins. 
But he can imitate those human traits and actions 
which rendered Jesus so beautiful in His character 
and so lovely in His life. Even these actions 
cannot be imitated perfectly by imperfect, sinful 
man, but they may be imitated sincerely though 
imperfectly. The little child can copy the writ- 
ing of the teacher, though his effort be far short 
of a perfect imitation. We may follow in the 
footsteps of Jesus, though we follow afar off. 
In this sense we may imitate all of those merely 
human traits and actions which were revealed to 
us in the life and character of Christ. As Christ 
loved God and man, so may each of His followers 
cultivate in his heart love to God, who so loved 
him as to give His only Son to suffer and die for 
him, and to his fellowmen who are bound to him by 
common hopes and needs and salvation. As 
Christ was gentle and kind and tender and good in 
His feelings and conduct towards the poor and 
sinful and needy, so should they be who claim to 
have caught His spirit and who seek to extend the 
blessings of His gospel to others. As Christ 
forgave His enemies and prayed for those who did 



220 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Him wrong, so may His disciples learn to do ac- 
cording to His plain and positive command, 
" Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do 
good to them that hate you and pray for them 
that despitefully use you and persecute you that 
you may be the children of your Father which is 
in heaven ; for He maketh His sun to rise on the 
evil and on the good, and sendeth his rain on the 
just and on the unjust." As Christ was honest 
and honorable and upright in all the relations of 
life, so should be all those who seek to walk in 
His footsteps. As Christ was accustomed to wor- 
ship and pray and serve, so should each of His 
disciples seek to do. 

There are many and strong reasons why we 
should become Christians. God commands it. 
When He brought His Son into the world He said 
to men, " This is My beloved Son in whom I am 
well pleased. Hear ye him." He commands and 
enjoins upon us each and every element that en- 
ters into the Christian character. He bids us 
forsake sin and put on the Lord Jesus. He 
teaches us that we must have the spirit of Christ 
and receive His grace into our hearts. He di- 
rects us to obey His commands and imitate His 
example. This duty is laid upon our hearts and 
consciences by the highest authority. To re- 
ceive and rest upon Christ for salvation, to obey 
His commands and to imitate His example is to 
comply with the will of our God. To refuse to 
become a Christian is to reject the highest author- 



WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 221 

it}> refuse the gift of God's love, and disobey 
His most positive command. As we would be 
loyal and obedient unto God we must accept His 
Son and seek salvation through His merit. 

We should accept salvation through Christ be- 
cause there is no other way. If there were several 
mediators and several plans of salvation equalty 
good, we might reject one and take another; but 
when God has clearly revealed to us that there is 
but one mediator and but one way of life, we ought 
to accept promptly Christ as our Savior and sal- 
vation through Him as our way to life eternal. 
It is expressly declared in the Word of God that 
" other foundation can no man lay than that 
which is laid, which is Jesus Christ " ; that " no 
man cometh unto the Father but by Me " ; and 
that " neither is there salvation in any other : for 
there is none other name under heaven given 
among men whereby we must be saved." (Acts 
4:12.) 

By becoming Christians we can best serve our 
fellowmen. The spirit of Christianity is such 
that it has done more to bless and regenerate the 
world than all other systems. It holds up to man 
a higher standard and ideal, and prompts him to 
put forth the most earnest efforts to improve and 
develop himself that thus he may become the 
most efficient workman in the service of God and 
his fellowmen. It binds upon him the duty of 
seeking the highest good of his neighbor, and 
holds out to him the highest and richest rewards 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

for his service, both in this life and in that which 
is to come. It teaches him to be " diligent in busi- 
ness, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord." The 
moment a man submits to the authority of the 
Lord, He sends him forth into the vineyard to 
work. He teaches him to do " good unto all men 
as he has opportunity." He sends him forth to 
fight the battles of the right against the wrong. 
He bids him " go home and tell what great things 
the Lord hath done for thee and how He hath 
had mercy on thy soul." He commissions him to 
" go into all the world and preach the gospel to 
every creature." 

To become a Christian one becomes an heir of 
God, " to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled 
and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for 
you who are kept by the power of God through 
faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed at the 
last day." Who can measure the value of such an 
inheritance? Who can measure the riches and 
honors of such a kingdom? To be a child of God 
is to have the protection of God thrown round 
you, to have His guidance, His love and His help 
in every time of need. Who can tell the glory, 
the honor and immortality and eternal life laid 
up for those who put their trust in Him? 
" Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, neither have 
entered into the heart of man, the things which 
God hath prepared for them that love Him." 
We know not what we shall be, " but we know 
that when He appeareth we shall be like Him for 



WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 223 

we shall see Him as He is." We feel assured that 
whatever He may prepare for His people will be 
worthy of His own glorious nature, suited to the 
wants of His people and sufficient to keep them 
from all spiritual want. " They shall hunger no 
more, neither shall they thirst any more, for the 
Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall feed 
them and shall lead them unto fountains of living 
water; and God shall wipe away all tears from 
their eyes." 

By becoming Christians we can best glorify 
God. We are taught that " he that honoreth the 
Son honoreth the Father," and that by letting 
our Christian light shine we " glorify our Father 
which is in heaven." In proportion as we obey 
the command of Christ, seek the salvation of our 
souls and the spiritual welfare of our fellowmen, 
will we show forth the praises of Him who hath 
called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. 
Each believer becomes a monument to the wisdom 
and power and goodness of God. Each act of 
service rendered to God or man serves to illus- 
trate the grace of God and displays His good- 
ness, love and mercy. While we cannot add any- 
thing to the essential glory of God and while we 
cannot make any brighter the brightness of the 
glor} T of His Son, we can at least let that glory 
shine into our hearts and through our lives and 
thus increase the size of the circle in which the 
rays of His declarative glory shine, and the num- 
ber of those who shall behold and admire that 



224 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

glory. Thus we shall best illustrate the power 
and goodness and glory of God in our own lives, 
and best win others who shall show forth His 
praise. As, therefore, you would be true to your- 
self, to your fellowmen and to your God, become 
a Christian without further delay. Enlist in His 
service and work for the advancement of His 
cause. If you are already a Christian, become an 
earnest, consecrated follower of Christ that you 
may secure the highest good for your own soul, 
best promote the welfare of your fellowmen and 
the glory of the Lord God of your salvation. 



CHAPTER XX 

THE METHOD OF JUSTIFICATION 

The friends of Job assumed that the only ex- 
planation of his afflictions was that he had been 
guilty of some great sin. Bildad, among others, 
took this position and asserted that Job had talked 
too much and had claimed too much as to his 
relation to God and as to his service to God. To 
this charge Job made no reply. Then Bildad still 
further asserted that God would not " pervert 
justice nor cast off the perfect man." To this 
position Job assents, but raises the question as 
to where such a man could be found, and the fur- 
ther question, following the failure to find such a 
man, as to how should sinful man be just with 
God. No more important question could be pro- 
posed. It is a question of pardon and acceptance 
before God. It is a question of deliverance from 
the penalty of sin and of restoration to the favor 
of God. It is a question of acquittal before the 
bar of God's justice. It is a question of salvation. 
It is a question of the possession of a title to the 
heavenly inheritance and so of our right and title 
to all of the privileges and blessings of heaven. 

What, then, is it to be just with God? What 

225 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

is justification? It is the opposite of condemna- 
tion. To be condemned is to be declared guilty. 
It is to be declared liable to the penalty of the 
law. It is the assertion by proper authority that 
because the law has been violated the offender 
must be punished according to the provision of 
the law. To be justified, then, would be to be de- 
clared not guilty. It is to be declared not liable 
to the penalty of the law. It is the assertion by 
proper authority that because the demands of the 
law have been satisfied the sinner who accepts that 
satisfaction shall not be punished. It includes 
all this and more, for it provides not only that the 
sinner shall not be punished, but shall be par- 
doned and received back into the favor of God. 
In language with which most of you are familiar, 
" justification is an act of God's free grace, 
wherein He pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth 
us as righteous in His sight, only for the right- 
eousness of Christ imputed to us, and received 
by faith alone." It would be interesting to dwell 
upon each element of this definition, noting that it 
is an act of God alone, that it springs from His 
free and sovereign grace, that it covers the for- 
giveness of all of our sins, that it restores us to a 
position of righteousness and favor before God, 
and that this blessing is bestowed upon us only 
for the sake of what the Savior did on our behalf. 
It is probably more important to dwell upon this 
last element of the definition than any of the 
others, both because it relates to the very 



METHOD OF JUSTIFICATION 227 

foundation of our salvation and because it has 
been so misrepresented and misunderstood by 
those who would teach men what is the real ground 
of their pardon and acceptance with God. 

Some have found this ground in the general 
mercy of God apart from the atonement of 
Christ. While it is readily admitted that to find 
the source of our salvation we must go back to 
the love of God, it should not be overlooked that 
it is to that love expressed through the channel of 
the death of God's beloved Son in the sinner's 
room and stead. " In this was manifested the 
love of God toward us, because that God 
sent His only begotten Son into the worlds that 
we might live through Him." (I John 4? : 9.) 
The idea that God would exercise that mercy 
towards guilty and sinful man without any satis- 
faction to the law overlooks the fact that God 
has other attributes which must be maintained 
just as carefully as mercy. His holiness, which 
impels Him to punish sin by forever barring it 
from His presence, must be kept unspotted. His 
justice, which prompts Him to render unto every 
man according to his deeds, must be kept untar- 
nished; and His truth, which renders it certain 
that He will do all that He promises or threatens, 
must not be broken. " Without holiness no man 
shall see the Lord." " Shall not the Judge of all 
of the earth do right? " " My covenant will I not 
break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my 
lips." (Psalms 89:34.) He threatened to pun- 



228 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ish sin with death, and with death He hath and 
will punish sin. To fail to do so would be to vio- 
late His truth and holiness and justice. Hence 
you cannot look for pardon and acceptance merely 
from the general mercy of God. 

Others have sought a ground of justification in 
good works which man can do. They hold that 
the evil which man has done may be counterbal- 
anced by the good deeds which he may subse- 
quently render before God. This class is repre- 
sented by the young man who came to Christ, ask- 
ing Him, " Good master, what good thing shall I 
do that I may have eternal life ? " and who, when 
referred to the commandments, claimed to have 
kept them all from his youth up. The Savior 
pointed out to him the fatal defect in his obedi- 
ence when he revealed to him his unwillingness 
to give up his worldly possessions for the sake of 
the kingdom of heaven. The trouble with this 
theory is that the good deeds presented do not 
come up to the requirements of the law. This 
is God's law. It is perfect like its Author. It 
requires perfect obedience in every thought and 
feeling and word and deed at every moment of life. 
Only such obedience can win the favor of God and 
secure the salvation of the soul. But no mere 
man ever hath or can present such obedience. All 
come short in some respects. " There * is not a 
just man on earth that doeth good and sinneth 
not." But if he sin, his obedience is not perfect 
and hence cannot stand the test of the law. No 



METHOD OF JUSTIFICATION 229 

man has ever done the best he could, and if he did 
the best he could, it would not be good enough to 
meet the demands of the law. Besides, " God re- 
quireth that which is past." Suppose a man 
could begin today and live a perfect life till the 
day of his death. Would that settle the claims of 
the law for the past? Suppose you were in debt 
to a merchant one hundred dollars for goods 
bought in the past, and that you were to propose 
to settle your account by paying cash for all pur- 
chases made from this day on till the end. 
Would such a proposition be accepted? Would 
not the merchant answer, " What about your old 
account? How do you propose to settle that?" 
So " God requireth that which is past." How will 
you settle the old disobedience by your proposed 
future obedience? This God declares to be im- 
possible for " by the deeds of the law shall no 
flesh living be justified, for by the law is the knowl- 
edge of sin." The law was never intended to 
atone for sin. It warns against sin. It reveals 
sin and threatens sin with the merited punish- 
ment, but makes no provision for the pardon of 
sin. The carpenter's square does not make the 
crooked timber straight. It only makes plain the 
uneven places. So it is with the law. It shows 
the extent of our deviation from the obedience 
which God requires. 

Still others have thought to commend them- 
selves to God and secure pardon at His hands 
by penance and sorrow. By performing some 



230 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

painful work imposed by the Church and by deep 
sorrow and mortification of the flesh they hope to 
satisfy justice for sins committed after baptism. 
Such a means of satisfaction finds no authority 
in the Word of God. It dishonors the atonement 
of Christ and offers the discharge of one duty as 
a satisfaction for the neglect of another. The 
infliction of pain on the body can never atone for 
the sin of the soul which uses the body as its in- 
strument of sin. Sorrow, so far from being a 
satisfaction for sin, is an acknowledgment of sin. 
Why be sorry if you have not sinned? Sorrow 
may lead one to go out and hang himself and thus 
become guilty of self-murder. Neither sorrow 
nor bodily pain can ever satisfy the law of God 
for the sin of the soul. They are only forms of 
works ; they are confession of sin and they are 
the efforts of sinful men and must, therefore, fall 
short of satisfaction to God's holy and perfect law. 
Some, taking faith from its position as the in- 
strumental cause of salvation, have assigned to it 
the merit of the meritorious cause. Instead of 
viewing it as the hand by which the blessings of 
pardon and salvation are received, they claim for 
it a purchasing power by which it secures for those 
who exercise it the pardon and favor of God. 
The fatal objection to this theory is that faith is 
represented as the gift of God and as the means 
by which, rather than the cause on account of 
which, we secure salvation. " By grace ye are 
saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; 



METHOD OF JUSTIFICATION 231 

it is the gift of God." If it be the gift of God, it 
cannot be that which purchaseth salvation from 
God. Faith does not earn salvation; it simply 
accepts the redemption which Christ purchased 
and bestowed upon man as a free gift. " The au- 
thor and finisher of our faith " is God and not 
ourselves. 

Some have supposed that man shall be restored 
to the favor of God by long and severe punish- 
ment in the other world. Such persons forget 
that punishment does not purify. It may serve to 
vindicate justice and to deter men from sin, but 
it has no power either to secure pardon or to 
cleanse the heart. On the contrary, it frequently 
has the effect of hardening the heart and arousing 
a spirit of revenge. Then, too, death has no 
power to change the moral character of the sin- 
ner. If he dies in his sin, he will go into eternity 
with a sinful nature. He will thus go beyond 
all the restraining influences of home and church 
and state and the Spirit. If his life here, under 
circumstances so favorable to holiness, failed to 
incline him to turn to God and live, what hope 
can there be that amid the unhallowed influences 
of the world of lost spirits he will bring forth 
fruits meet for repentance? What hope that the 
sorrow and suffering which he shall experience 
there will tend to soften and purify his heart or 
appease the wrath of God? There he will not 
only be beyond the bounds of all the good influ- 
ences which were thrown around him in this world, 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

but amid the most degrading influences of the 
abode of the lost from among angels and men. 
There Satan, the arch enemy of God and man, has 
his habitation and exercises his rule and dominion. 
There thousands of his demons stand ready to do 
his bidding. And there many wicked men " with- 
out God and without hope " are bound to exert 
an influence far from favorable to repentance and 
faith and obedience. So far from hoping that 
men may there cease from sinning, the probability 
is that they will sink deeper and deeper into sin. 
They dwell in the very home of sin, and are sur- 
rounded with its most determined advocates. As 
long as they sin they must be punished. This 
punishment is not to be a limited one, but, accord- 
ing to the teaching of the only Savior whom God 
hath revealed, " eternal " and " everlasting." So 
that the door of mercy is forever closed there and 
between that lone world of despair and the heaven 
to which they refused to go, " there is a great 
gulf fixed so that they who would pass from hence 
cannot, neither can they pass to us that would 
come from thence." (Luke 16: 26.) 

What, then, is the true and only ground upon 
which the penitent sinner can base a hope of being 
pardoned and received back into the favor of 
God? The only Scriptural answer is that it is 
the righteousness of Christ. It was this that 
gave Paul confidence in the power of this gospel 
as he went to preach it in the great and wicked 
city of Rome. He said : "lam not ashamed of 



METHOD OF JUSTIFICATION 233 

the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God 
unto salvation to everyone that believeth; for 
therein is revealed the righteousness of Christ." 
That righteousness is made up of all that Christ 
did and suffered in our stead. It consists of His 
perfect obedience to the precepts of the law, and 
His suffering and sorrow and death in behalf of 
sinners. Hence it is written : " Christ is the end 
of the law of righteousness to everyone that be- 
lieveth." " Christ hath redeemed us from the 
curse of the law, being made a curse for us." " He 
died, the just for the unjust, that He might bring 
us to God." Hence He is called " our righteous- 
ness," and hence Paul prayed that he might be 
" found in Him, not having mine own righteous- 
ness, which is of the law, but that which is through 
the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of 
God by faith." (Philippians 3:9.) 

If, then, this be the only righteousness through 
which our sins can be pardoned and we stand ac- 
quitted before the bar of God, we should all seek 
promptly and seek earnestly a part in it. This 
is the only foundation on which we can build with 
confidence for eternity. This is the only wed- 
ding garment in which we can enter the palace of 
the King and be guests at the marriage supper 
of the Lamb. None who have been called into the 
kingdom should boast, for their salvation is all 
of grace and hence they should ascribe all the 
glory and honor of their redemption unto Him 
who loved them and gave Himself for them. 



CHAPTER XXI 

MEMBERSHIP IN THE FAMILY OF GOD 

Of all of the disciples of Jesus, the apostle John 
seems to have had the best opportunity and the 
most intense desire to learn the love of God as re- 
vealed in Christ, the Son. From that day on 
which he heard the message, " Behold the Lamb of 
God which taketh away the sin of the world," 
until the day of his death he followed Jesus that 
he might know His character, enjoy His love and 
do His will. Early in life he became one of the 
twelve friends of Jesus who enjoyed the rare privi- 
lege of being under the personal instruction of the 
Master for three years, of witnessing His works 
of power, hearing His words of wisdom and then 
of being sent forth to preach His gospel. Within 
this band of friends John and two others were 
permitted to be drawn closer to the Savior than 
the other disciples. These three alone were with 
Him on the Mount of Transfiguration to witness 
His glory there; they alone were with Him in the 
Garden to see His agony there; and they alone 
were allowed to be with Him when He entered the 
chamber of death and raised the daughter of Jai- 

rus. Then closer than the other two was John 

234 



THE FAMILY OF GOD 235 

drawn so that he was known as " that disciple 
whom Jesus loved." He leaned upon Jesus' bosom 
at the Last Supper; to him the Savior told the 
awful secret of who should betray Him; and to 
him the Savior commended His mother as He hung 
upon the cross. And John outlived all of the 
other apostles, so that he had a longer period in 
which to know and experience that love. Who, 
then, so well qualified to testify as to the love of 
God in Christ Jesus? 

And what is his testimony ? Hear it in his own 
words. " Herein is love, not that we loved God 
but that He loved us and sent His Son to be a 
propitiation for our sins." " Behold what man- 
ner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that 
we should be called the sons of God." That 
which excited the wonder and admiration of the 
apostle of love was that God should make provi- 
sion to bring guilty and lost sinners into His 
family through the gift of His own Son. Men 
may be called sons of God as they are creatures 
of His power. He is their Father and they are 
His children. " Are we not all children of one 
Father? Hath not one God created us?" In 
this sense, too, the angels are spoken of as the 
sons of God. " Where wast thou when I laid the 
foundation of the earth, when all of the sons of 
God shouted for joy? " 

Individuals and even nations are called the sons 
of God because of special privileges bestowed upon 
them. For example, when God sent Moses to lead 



236 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the children of Israel out of the land of bondage, 
He directed him to say to Pharaoh : " Israel is 
my son, even my first born." (Exodus 4 : 22.) 

Then men are called the sons of God, the chil- 
dren of God, when God adopts them into His 
family. " When the fulness of time was come, 
God sent forth His Son . . . that we might re- 
ceive the adoption of sons." (Galatians 4:4.) 
" Ye are all children of God by faith in Christ." 
The act by which one person receives another into 
the room of a child and gives to him all of the 
rights and privileges of a son is adoption. This 
custom seems to have been practiced among many 
nations. Among the Egyptians Moses was 
adopted into the family of Pharaoh's daughter 
and became her son. Among the Jews, Esther 
was adopted into the family of Mordecai and be- 
came his daughter. Among the Romans the act 
of adoption was made a matter of public concern 
and record. A man intending to adopt a child 
was required to draw up a paper setting forth 
his reasons and secure the consent or approval of 
the proper officer. When this was secured, a bill 
was introduced into the Assembly to make the 
adoption valid. Then the intended father ap- 
peared before the proper authority and said to 
the child : " Art thou willing to become my son? " 
And the child, or some one speaking for him, an- 
swered : " I am willing." Thus the relation was 
established, the child entered the new family, se- 



THE FAMILY OF GOD 237 

cured the name, became subject to the authority 
and was made an heir of the father. It is with 
reference to this custom that the sacred writers 
speak when they would illustrate the act by which 
God receives believers into His family and gives 
to them spiritual rights and privileges, " It is an 
act of God's free grace whereby we are received 
into the number and have a right to all of the 
privileges of the sons of God." It flows from 
God's love and is according to His gracious pur- 
pose. 

" But it may be asked if we become the born sons 
of God by regeneration, or the new birth, where 
is the consistency of our being made the adopted 
sons of God? Where is the propriety of a father 
adopting his own child ? Well, the answer is plain 
and easy: Regeneration gives us the nature of 
a child; adoption gives us the rights of a child. 
We must remember that as sinners we lost both 
our filial spirit and our filial standing — both the 
heart and the status of a child. We need the res- 
toration of both. Now regeneration gives us the 
nature, the spirit, the temper, the disposition, the 
heart of a child, while adoption gives us the rights, 
the privileges, the legal standing of a child. If 
an earthly father had cast off and disinherited a 
bad-hearted child, then the restoration of that 
child would require that two things be done ; — 
(1) that his heart be changed, and (2) that the 
decree of disinheritance be annulled and a decree 



238 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

of inheritance be entered in his favor. For the 
sinner, regeneration does the one, and adoption 
does the other." (Dr. R. A. Webb.) 

Concerning the wonderful love of God in ad- 
mitting sinful men into this relation, John writes : 
" Behold what manner of love the Father hath 
bestowed upon us that we should be called 
the sons of God." He seems to feel unable to ex- 
press fully his wonder and gratitude at such a 
manifestation of love and calls upon us to behold 
and admire it. Just as when the angel, who was 
sent to announce the birth of the Savior, thought 
upon the love of God shown in that event, and 
said, " Behold, I bring you glad tidings of great 
joy, for unto you is born this day in the city of 
David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord," so 
when John meditated upon the love of God in 
elevating men into His family, he exclaimed, " Be- 
hold (mark with attention) what manner of love 
the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should 
be called the sons of God." Just as when Christ 
stilled the tempest the disciples were astonished 
and said, " What manner of man is this that even 
the winds and the sea obey Him," so when John 
contemplated the action of God in adopting him- 
self and others into His family, he said, " What 
manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon 
us!" 

The magnitude of God's love in receiving us 
into His family may be seen by considering the 



THE FAMILY OF GOD 239 

dignity and glory of Him who adopts us. The 
value of adoption depends upon the character and 
position of the person adopting. To be adopted 
into the family of a wise philosopher is a greater 
privilege than to be received into the family of an 
ignorant man. To be adopted by a king would 
be esteemed a greater privilege than to be a mem- 
ber of the family of an humble subject. To be 
given a place in the family of an upright judge 
would certainly be better for a child than to be 
made a member of the family of a condemned 
criminal. If it be an honor to be a member of 
the household of a wise man, what must be the esti- 
mate put upon the honor of membership in the 
family of the God who gave to that man all of 
his wisdom? If it be an honor to be the child of 
an earthly king, what an honor it must be to 
claim membership in the family of the King of 
Kings and Lord of Lords ! If it be a privilege 
to be related to an earthly judge, what a privilege 
to be related to the Judge of all of the earth! 
It is God, your Maker, all wise, all powerful, and 
perfect in justice, goodness and truth, who adopts 
sinful man into His family. And this He does 
not as men do — because of need of companion- 
ship — for already He enjoyed the society of the 
Trinity and of thousands of holy angels, and it 
needed but His creative word to bring thousands 
of other beings into existence. It was for our 
good and for His glory that He chose to bring 



240 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

into His family members of our fallen race. " Be- 
hold what manner of love the Father hath be- 
stowed." 

The dignity of the Being through whom we are 
adopted serves to magnify the love that led the 
Father to receive us into His family. It is 
through the Son that we receive membership in 
the family of God. " To as many as received 
Him, to them gave He power to become the sons 
of God, even to them that believe on His name." 
This Son was " the brightness of the Father's 
glory and the express image of His person." He 
possessed all of the wisdom of God, all of the power 
of God and all of the goodness of God. " He 
thought it no robbery to be equal with God." 
Yet, that man might share a place in the family 
of God, He " made Himself of no reputation and 
took upon Himself the form of a servant and was 
made in the likeness of men; and being found in 
fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became 
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." 
(Philippians 2:6-8.) "God so loved the world 
that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoso- 
ever believeth on Him should not perish but have 
everlasting life." 

The humble and low estate from which we are 
adopted still further increases the wonder of God's 
love in receiving us into His family. This high 
honor was not bestowed upon an angel, but upon 
man, " made a little lower than the angels." It 
was bestowed upon man, not as he reflected the 



THE FAMILY OF GOD 241 

divine image, but upon fallen man — when the 
crown had fallen from his head and when the im- 
age had faded from his soul. Sin had invaded the 
soul of man and had darkened the mind, hardened 
the heart, perverted the will and depraved his en- 
tire moral nature. Yet God stooped to adopt 
sinful and lost men into His family and to make 
them " meet to become partakers of the inheritance 
of the saints in light." 

The high dignity, honor and privileges bestowed 
upon those who are thus adopted should increase 
our estimate and appreciation of the love of God 
who provides them. When men adopt children 
into their families, they give them their names ; 
so, when God adopts us into His family, He calls 
us by His name. He claims us as sons and daugh- 
ters in His household. But He not only calls us 
by His name; He imparts to us His nature. In 
this respect He goes far beyond men. They may 
give their name to children, but cannot impart to 
them a new nature, so that they know not but 
that some evil disposition, inherited from their 
fathers, may in after years develop, and bring 
sadness and disappointment where hope and joy 
and satisfaction were expected. When God 
adopts into .His family, He imparts to the person 
adopted a new nature. " To as many as received 
Him, to them gave He power to become the sons 
of God, even to them which believe on His name, 
which are born not of blood, nor of the will of the 
flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." They 



£42 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

are born of God and so partake of His nature. 
That likeness may at first be very faint, and may 
be obscured by indwelling sin, but it will grow 
more and more distinct until it shall be complete 
and the child of God shall be satisfied by awaking 
with His likeness. " Beloved, now are we sons of 
God, and it doth not appear what we shall be ; but 
we know that when He appeareth, we shall be like 
Him, for we shall see Him as He is." 

When men adopt children into their families, 
they give to them all of the rights and privileges 
of children born in the home. Has such a child 
a right to expect the love of the father? Then 
have we, who have been received into the family 
of God, a right to enjoy the love of a tender heav- 
enly Father. " Like as a father pitieth his chil- 
dren, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him." 
" Behold, what manner of love the Father hath be- 
stowed upon us that we should be called the sons 
of God." Has the child the right to look to the 
earthly father for guidance and instruction? So 
have we the right to look to God for guidance and 
instruction. He says : " I will guide thee and 
teach thee in the way in which thou shalt go." 
" If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who 
giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and 
it shall be given him." Has the child a right to 
expect of the father protection in the hour of 
danger? So has the child of God a right to look 
to his heavenly Father in every time of trial and 
temptation for protection against the enemies of 



THE FAMILY OF GOD 243 

Lis soul. " If God be for us, who can be against 
us ? " " No temptation shall overtake you above 
that ye are able to bear, but with every tempta- 
tion I will provide also a way of escape that ye 
may be able to bear it." 

No one can tell fully all of the privileges and 
blessings of a child in the home of a good father; 
so no one can ascribe adequately the joys and 
privileges of the children of God. " Eye hath not 
seen nor ear heard, neither have entered into the 
heart of man the things that God hath prepared 
for them that love Him." " The Lord will give 
grace and glory; no good thing will He withhold 
from them that walk uprightly." " All things 
shall work together for good to them that love God, 
to them who are called according to His purpose." 

Then, too, the adopted child becomes the heir 
of his father ; so the children of God are " heirs 
of God and joint heir of Christ." The character 
of the inheritance to which we are heirs beautifully 
and strikingly illustrates the love of the Father 
who provided it. It is free from all suffering and 
sorrow and sin and death. It is replete with all 
joy and happiness and holiness and life. It is to 
be shared with angels of all ranks, and the re- 
deemed of all ages and from all lands. It is to be 
with Christ in the New Jerusalem. It is to be 
" incorruptible, undefiled and f adeth not away, 
reserved in heaven for you who are kept by the 
power of God through faith unto salvation, 
ready to be revealed at the last day." What a glo- 



244 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

rious hope ! What a blessed destiny ! What won- 
drous love ! If we have been received into the fam- 
ily of God let us prize the exalted privilege, be 
grateful for the love of God who bestowed it, and 
seek daily to live and walk worthy of our Father. 
If we are still spiritual orphans, let us seek admis- 
sion to the family of God through faith in Christ 
the Savior, that we may share the blessings and 
privileges of the sons of God. 



CHAPTER XXII 
SANCTIFICATION 

God begins the work of restoring His image to 
the soul in the new birth, continues it in the work 
of sanctification and completes it when He wel- 
comes the believer into glory. " Grace is glory 
begun, glory is grace completed." " He which 
hath begun a good work in you will perform it 
until the day of Jesus Christ." The work which 
God accomplishes upon the soul from the moment 
when He renews the heart till the time when He 
completes the work of cleansing is called sanctifi- 
cation. 

The leading thought conveyed by this word is 
that of separation. Sometimes it is the separa- 
tion of persons or things from a common to a 
particular purpose, as when God says, " I will 
prepare or sanctify destroyers against you." 
(Jeremiah 22: 7.) Sometimes it denotes the sepa- 
ration of persons or things from a secular to a 
sacred use. Thus the temple, the priests, the le- 
vites and the sacrifices were all set apart for use 
in the service of God. In this sense God set apart 
His own Son to the great work of redemption ; and 

Christ is said to have sanctified Himself for His 

245 



246 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

people in that He devoted Himself to the work of 
their salvation. Then, too, God is said to sane-* 
tify Himself when He declares or shows the holi- 
ness and glory of His character in contrast to 
that of all other things. We are said to sanc- 
tify God in our hearts when we regard and treat 
Him with that reverence and awe which are due 
unto His high and holy character. Under the 
ceremonial law people were sanctified or cleansed 
from defilement by complying with the require- 
ments of the levitical law. Under the moral law 
persons are said to be sanctified when they are 
cleansed from the moral defilement of sin by the 
wonderful provisions of the gospel. The idea in 
both of these cases is that of separation, or cleans- 
ing from that which these laws respectively for- 
bid. Under one the man who became ceremoni- 
ally unclean by touching the leper or the dead 
was required to submit himself to a process of 
purification before he could enter the congregation 
or engage in the service of the sanctuary. The 
other law requires that he who has become defiled 
with sin must be cleansed from its pollution before 
he can enter heaven and enjoy the blessings and 
privileges of the upper sanctuary. It is in this 
last sense that believers are said to be cleansed 
and sanctified that they may be " made meet for 
the inheritance of the saints in light." It denotes 
that work by which sinners are cleansed more 
and more from sin and brought more and more 
into likeness of their Lord and Redeemer until at 



SANCTIFICATION 247 

last they shall be satisfied by awaking with His 
likeness. " Sanctification is the work of God's 
free grace whereby we are renewed in the whole 
man after the image of God and are enabled more 
and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteous- 
ness." " This is the will of God, even your sanc- 
tification." (I Thessalonians 4:3.) 

The agent of sanctification is the Holy Ghost. 
It must be accomplished according to the divine 
will and by divine power. It is a work of such im- 
portance and magnitude that it could never be 
accomplished by human power. No power but 
that of the almighty Spirit by whom we were made 
can restore to our souls the image of God lost 
through sin. The Father wills the result. The 
Son by His life and death and resurrection meets 
the demands of justice, atones for sin, and removes 
all of the legal obstacles to man's redemption, and 
then the Holy Spirit is sent of the Father and the 
Son to work the moral change in man's nature, 
to qualify him for receiving and enjoying the 
blessings of salvation. Hence this work is as- 
cribed to the Spirit. He begins, He carries on 
and He completes the work of cleansing man from 
sin. " It is the Spirit that quickeneth." (John 
6:63.) "Not by works of righteousness which 
we have done, but according to His mrecy He 
saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and re- 
newing of the Holy Ghost, which He shed on us 
abundantly, through Jesus Christ our Savior." 
(Titus 3:3-6.) " God hath, from the beginning, 



248 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

chosen you to salvation through sanctification of 
the Spirit and belief of the truth." (II Thessa- 
lonians 2:13.) In regeneration the Spirit re- 
stores spiritual life and implants holy dispositions, 
and in sanctification He carries on the work of 
enlightening, renewing, cleansing and purifying 
until death, when He removes the last stain of 
sin and thus prepares the soul for the holy en- 
joyments, employments and associations of 
heaven. 

This work of the Spirit extends to the " whole 
man." As sin defiled every faculty of man's soul, 
darkening the mind, depraving the heart, pervert- 
ing the will, and robbing man of his moral like- 
ness to God, so must the renewing influence of the 
Holy Spirit be felt in every power and capacity 
of man's nature. The mind must be enlightened, 
the dispositions of the heart changed, the will re- 
newed and the image of God restored. The body, 
under the influence of a sinful and unchanged soul, 
is frequently used for unholy purposes, but when 
the soul which inhabits and controls the body 
has been renewed, the body must thenceforth be- 
come an instrument only for holy ends and pur- 
poses, and thus the blessings of the cleansing ex- 
tend to the body as well as the soul, and hence 
the prayer of Paul for his fellow Christians : " I 
pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body, 
be preserved blameless unto the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ." 

This work of God's Holy Spirit might be 



SANCTIFICATION 249 

wrought at once in the moment of regeneration, 
but as a matter of fact both the Bible and Chris- 
tian experience seem clearly to teach that it is a 
gradual, progressive work, not ordinarily com- 
pleted until the hour of death. When God justi- 
fies, He does so by one instantaneous act in the 
court of heaven, pardoning all of our sins and 
accepting us as righteous in His sight only for 
the righteousness of Christ reckoned to our ac- 
count and received by faith on our part. It is 
an act by which we are at once delivered from a 
state of guilt and condemnation and transferred 
into one of pardon and acceptance before God. 
So when God regenerates a soul, He does at once, 
by an immediate act of His Holy Spirit, impart 
to it the principle of spiritual life. The . soul, 
dead in trespasses and sins one moment, is made 
alive in Christ Jesus the next moment. This act 
is wrought in the soul, and brings about a radical 
change in the character and disposition so that at 
once the soul begins to love the things which it 
once hated and to hate the things which it once 
loved. It ceases to be at enmity with God and 
becomes a lover of that which is holy and right 
and good. But when God begins the work of mak- 
ing us holy He does not at once complete the 
work, but by a gradual process He works the 
cleansing necessary to prepare us for heaven. 
Having begun a good work in us, He will carry it 
on till the day of Jesus Christ; but this He will 
do by enabling us more and more to die unto sin 



250 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

and live unto righteousness. Hence such expres- 
sions as these : " Grow in grace and in the knowl- 
edge of the Lord Jesus Christ " ; " Add to your 
faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to 
knowledge temperance, and to temperance godli- 
ness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to 
brotherly kindness charity." (II Peter 1:5-7.) 
If we were made perfect in holiness at once, there 
would be no room for growth and increase in the 
Christian virtues. Besides, it is expressly said 
in the first chapter of I John : " If we say that 
we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth 
is not in us." Paul, with all of his wonderful 
attainments in the divine life, said : " Brethren, 
I count not myself to have apprehended: but this 
one thing I do, forgetting those things which are 
behind, and reaching forth unto those things 
which are before: I press forward to the mark 
for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ 
Jesus." (Philippians 3:13-14.) One person 
may grow more rapidly than another, and the 
same person may grow more rapidly at one time 
than at another, but all true believers must pass 
from the condition of being babes in Christ to that 
of being strong in the Lord and in the power of 
His might by a process of gradual growth. " As 
new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the 
word that ye may grow thereby." It is as much 
a law in the spiritual life that men should grow 
in grace as it is a law in the physical world that 



SANCTIFICATION 251 

plants and animals reach their maturity by 
growth. " So is the kingdom of God, as if a man 
should cast seed into the ground . . . and the 
seed should spring up and grow, he knoweth not 
how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of her- 
self; first the blade, then the ear, after that the 
full corn in the ear." (Mark 4:26-28.) The 
seed is cast into the ground. The early and the 
latter rains fall. The seed germinates, springs 
up, grows in height and strength, blooms and 
yields fruit for the use of man, who in the harvest 
time gathers the fruit into his storehouse for serv- 
ice in the future. So the principle of spiritual 
life, implanted by the Spirit in the heart of man, 
and watered by the showers of God's grace, 
springs up, grows, develops in strength, and yields 
fruit in the garden of the Lord until the harvest 
time when the Lord will send forth the angels to 
gather the fruit into His garners. As leaven 
gradually assimilates and transforms the entire 
lump of flour, so the grace of God in the heart of 
man gradually brings the whole character and 
disposition of the soul under its power and influ- 
ence. As the child grows and develops in passing 
from childhood to manhood, so the child of God 
grows in grace and knowledge as he passes from 
childhood up to the measure of the stature of a 
perfect man in Christ Jesus. This work must be 
carried on and on until at last every power and 
faculty of mind and heart and will shall have been 



252 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

brought under the complete control of the divine 
Will and until the soul shall reflect the image of 
God perfectly. 

As to the manner in which this change is 
wrought by the Spirit we do not fully understand, 
but of the fact there can be no reasonable doubt. 
It is a fact that the principle of physical life hath 
been given to the plants of the earth, and that this 
principle, placed in material substance, grows and 
develops, we know not how, and yet we receive and 
act upon the fact at every step of life. Shall we 
not, then, receive the teaching of God's Word that 
the principle of spiritual life imparted by divine 
grace to the soul of man can and does grow and 
assimilate to itself that in which it is placed until 
the God likeness be evident to all who have eyes 
with which to see? Is it not an admitted fact 
that God made our souls and gave us the power 
to think and love and choose? Can not the same 
almighty Power rectify and renew our souls when 
they have become impaired by sin? The man who 
can make a watch, can repair that watch. The God 
who can make a soul in His own image, can restore 
that image when it has been marred by sin. It 
was good philosophy as well as good theology 
which led David to go to His God and pray: 
" Create within me a clean heart, O God, and re- 
new a right spirit within me. Take not thy Holy 
Spirit from me, but uphold me with thy free 
Spirit." He felt sure that the same almighty 
Being who had created all souls could heal and 



SANCTIFICATION 253 

cleanse a soul that had become defiled with sin. 
It matters little to us how the change is wrought 
if only such a change restores us to the likeness 
of our Lord and Redeemer. 

We are assured that when this change is begun 
in our hearts, it will be carried on to completion. 
This might be expected from the fact that God 
is the author of the change. The will of Him who 
doeth all things according to His own pleasure 
is our sanctification. The gift and sacrifice of 
His own Son was " that He might redeem us from 
all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar 
people zealous of good works." His prayer, 
based upon that sacrifice, was, " Sanctify them 
through Thy truth ; Thy Word is truth " ; and the 
very purpose for which the Holy Spirit takes up 
His abode in the heart of the believer is that He 
may cleanse, enlighten, purify, and save from sin. 
The power of God is infinite. His purposes must 
be accomplished and His promises be fulfilled. God 
will surely do all of His holy will. His will con- 
cerning His people is that they shall be " sancti- 
fied," and His promise to them is that they shall 
be made like to Christ His Son. " Beloved, now 
are we the sons of God and it doth not yet appear 
what we shall be ; but we know that when He shall 
appear we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him 
as He is." Then " We all with open face, be- 
holding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord are 
changed into the same image, from glory to glory, 
even as by the Spirit of the Lord." (II Corinthi- 



254 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ans 3:18.) Such is the change to be wrought 
upon everyone who is brought into the family of 
God. 

By justification, through Christ, he secures a 
title to membership in God's family ; by regenera- 
tion he is born into that family; and by sanctifi- 
cation he is brought into likeness to His heavenly 
Father. The model after which this work shall be 
wrought is the character of Him who was holy, 
harmless, undeifiled, and separate from sinners. 
The agent by whom it is accomplished is the Holy 
Ghost and the instrument wielded by the Holy 
Ghost in effecting this change is the truth of God 
as revealed in His Word. The Word is expressly 
called " the sword of the Spirit." Christ prays : 
* Sanctify them through Thy truth ; Thy Word 
is truth." In all ordinary cases the truth must 
reach the heart before the Spirit works the change. 
In the case of those who die before their minds 
are sufficiently developed to apprehend the truth, 
we hold that God does, for Christ's sake, cleanse 
them from sin by the power of His Holy Spirit. 
But in the case of adults the truth of God is the 
invariable instrument by which the Holy Spirit 
slays the carnal enmity of the human heart and 
enlightens it in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. 
The truth must be present and the Spirit must 
use it before the enmity of the heart will be over- 
come and the eyes of the understanding will be 
opened, the heart changed and the soul cleansed. 



SANCTIFICATION 255 

" God hath chosen us unto salvation through the 
sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the 
truth." Hence the importance of bringing the 
truth into contact with the mind and heart of the 
Holy Spirit that the Holy Spirit may bless it to 
our conversion and growth in grace and knowledge. 
It is to the Spirit what the sword is to the soldier. 
It is to the soul what light is to the eye. It is to the 
believer what the sun is to the plant. It is to the 
soul what bread is to the body. The Word, as 
energized by the Holy Spirit, convicts of sin, en- 
lightens the understanding, leads in the way of 
holiness and causes the child of God to grow in 
grace and in fitness for service here and for hap- 
piness hereafter. 

Put a high value, then, upon the Word of God. 
Study its holy teachings and pray unto God to 
open the eyes of your understanding that you may 
be able to " behold wondrous things out of His 
law." Ask Him to teach you the gospel that the 
Word reveals that it may be made to you the 
power of God unto salvation. Find in the Bible 
teaching concerning the progress of sanctification 
a test of your Christian experience. If you are 
a Christian, the will of God is that you grow in 
grace and that you be enabled more and more to 
die unto sin and live unto righteousness. If this 
change is being wrought in your heart, there must 
be some progress. The live tree will grow and 
develop rapidly or slowly according to the soil 



256 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

and surroundings ; so the Christian made alive in 
Christ will grow and develop in holiness according 
to the use he makes of the means of grace which 
God hath appointed and according to the com- 
pany with which he is surrounded. A Christian 
may be hindered in his growth and may even seem, 
in seasons of coldness and indifference, to go 
backward, just as a tree may show little signs of 
life and growth in the cold and storms of winter. 
But, as in the springtime the tree will give evi- 
dence of life and growth, even so will the believer, 
under the influence of God's grace and the use of 
the means, give forth signs of the life and growth 
that mark his spiritual development. As surely 
as the principle of spiritual life has been im- 
planted within your soul by the power of the Holy 
Spirit, so surely will it manifest its presence and 
power by your growth in the divine life. 

Let each believer test his own life. Do you see 
more clearly and hate more intensely the sins that 
separated you from God? Do you see more 
clearly and love more ardently the holiness with- 
out which no man shall see the Lord? Has the 
power of sin over you been weakened ? Have your 
habits of holiness been strengthened? Does your 
love for Christ, His cause, His service and His 
people increase? If you can return satisfactory 
answers to such questions, you have reason to be- 
lieve that the work of grace has been begun in 
your heart and that it will be carried on to com- 
pletion. To that end pray more earnestly for the 



SANCTIFICATION 257 

presence, influence and power of the Holy Spirit 
by whom alone you may hope to be delivered from 
the power and pollution of sin, and transformed 
into the likeness of God. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

GOOD WORKS 

In the mind of the apostle Paul there was no 
conflict between faith and works. He who taught 
so clearly and so earnestly that men are justified 
and saved only through faith, insisted with equal 
zeal and clearness that faith must manifest itself 
in outward conduct and behavior. He who pro- 
claimed so fervently the message of God, " This 
is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation, 
that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sin- 
ners," delivered also, with equal fervor, this mes- 
sage of God, " This is a faithful saying and these 
things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they 
which have believed in God might be careful to 
maintain good works. These are good and profit- 
able unto men." (Titus 3:8.) God intends, 
then, that emphasis be put upon both of these 
great truths, that we are saved through faith in 
the person and work of Christ, but by such a 
faith as manifests its genuineness by leading those 
who possess it to seek earnestly to imitate the 
example of Him " who went about doing good." 
We are to believe in order to be saved, and we are 

to do good because we are saved. The impor- 

258 



GOOD WORKS 259 

tance of care in the maintaining of good works 
can scarcely be overestimated. 

By good works we are to understand such works 
as are done by one whose heart has been changed, 
by a real child of God. The virtues and good 
deeds of those who have not learned to know 
Christ and whose hearts have not been changed, 
have their place and their value among men, but 
are not to be ranked as belonging to the same class 
with those wrought by a soul that has been re- 
newed by the Spirit of God, and wrought under 
the influence of His love. The works of all oth- 
ers, however valuable, lack the essential quality 
which entitles them to be called good, viz. — the 
love of God. Good works are such as are author- 
ized and in harmony with the Word of God. 
They must be done not only out of love to Him, 
but in accordance with His will. Concerning all 
other works God asks, " Who hath required this 
at your hands? " In vain do they worship Me, 
teaching for doctrines the commandments of 
men." (Matthew 15: 9.) Good works must also 
spring from good motives, such as the love of God 
and a desire to promote His glory and to comply 
with His will. " Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily 
as unto the Lord and not unto men." Works, 
then, which spring from a renewed heart, which 
are in harmony with the divine law and which are 
prompted by the love of God, cannot fail to be 
pleasing in His sight. These and only these are 
good works in the Bible sense. 



260 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

It is important that we weigh well the duty of 
doing such works. They will furnish, for our own 
satisfaction, an evidence of the change of our 
hearts. No question should be deemed of greater 
importance to us than that relating to our stand- 
ing before God. Are we His friends or His ene- 
mies? Are we members of His kingdom or are 
we aliens? Are we His children or are we chil- 
dren of the wicked one? Two facts are clearly 
taught in the Word. One is that " the carnal 
mind is enmity to God, not subject to the law of 
God." The other is that when the heart under- 
goes the great change necessary to bring it into 
the family of God, it will love God and seek to do 
those things which are pleasing unto Him. " We 
love Him because He first loved us." And if we 
love Him, we will keep His commandments and His 
commandments will not be grievous unto us. If 
our faith " works by love, purifies the heart and 
overcomes the world," then the wondrous change 
has been wrought there by the Spirit of God. We 
have been born into the family of God and so have 
passed from death unto life. As the life of the 
natural body manifests its presence by outward 
movement, so does the presence of spiritual life 
in the soul make its presence known by outward 
spiritual, holy living. Or as the fruit reveals the 
character of the tree, so the deeds of the life give 
evidence of the state of the heart. " By their 
fruits ye shall know them." 

By maintaining good works you will best com- 



GOOD WORKS 261 

mend the cause of Christ to your fellowmen. If 
Christianity causes all who accept it to lead better 
and purer lives and to abound in good works, 
others will be able to see and appreciate its char- 
acter and value as being the source of so much 
good. Just as men value the tree that bears good 
fruit, so will they prize that which prompts and 
enables men to bring forth such peaceable fruits 
of righteousness in their lives. The graces of 
faith, hope and charity are invisible to the human 
eye until they become incarnate and manifest 
themselves in the daily life of some good man or 
woman. It was when Christ went about doing 
good that men came to know the love and com- 
passion that dwelt in His heart. In this way, 
also, may His followers commend His cause to 
their fellowmen. Such good works will prove of 
great service to others. " These things are good 
and profitable unto men." That is, they will con- 
fer real and lasting benefit upon them. Their 
wants will be relieved, their hearts will be com- 
forted, their footsteps will be directed, their bur- 
dens lightened and their lives and homes be made 
brighter. By good works orphans are fed and 
clothed and taught and trained and made happy 
and useful men and women. By good works the 
widow is comforted in her affliction and defended 
in her helplessness. By good deeds the sick are 
healed, the hungry are fed, the destitute are 
clothed, the ignorant instructed and the wayward 
are reclaimed. 



262 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

The forms of good deeds are as varied as the 
needs and misfortunes of the human race. Not 
only these outward and worldly blessings by the 
hands of those doing good, but the higher and 
more lasting spiritual blessings are often conveyed 
to men through the office of good deeds. The law 
of love not only requires that we do good to all 
men as we have opportunity, but that we seek 
to bring to them the highest good within our 
ability. Now God has seen wise to put within the 
hands of men the ability, under His blessing, of 
being the means of introducing others into the 
possession of the highest spiritual blessings. 
This is well expressed in the fifth chapter of 
James. " Brethren, if any of you do err from the 
truth and one convert him ; let him know that he 
which converteth a sinner from the error of his 
way shall save a soul from death and shall hide 
a multitude of sins." You can be the means of 
turning a sinner from the ways of sin, you can 
be the means of saving him from all of the evils 
wrapped up in the idea of spiritual and eternal 
death. You can be the means of leading him to 
the Savior and into all of the blessings of salva- 
tion. You can show him the way of pardon and 
cleansing and grace and glory and honor and im- 
mortality and eternal life. You can show him 
how to escape the dark abode of the lost and 
direct him in the way that leadeth unto " God's 
right hand where there is fulness of joy, and to 



GOOD WORKS 263 

His right hand where there are pleasures forever- 
more." 

The faithful maintenance of good works will 
meet with a gracious and a glorious reward in 
heaven. The Savior Himself taught, " Whosoever 
shall give to drink unto one of these little ones 
a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, 
verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his 
reward." (Matthew 10:42.) And with special 
reference to the leading of men into the highest 
spiritual blessings it is written, " They that be 
wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament ; 
and they that turn many unto righteousness as 
the stars forever and ever." (Daniel 12:3.) 
From the smallest to the largest, every blessing 
which we may be the means of securing for our 
fellow men shall meet with the approval of our 
heavenly Father and receive at His hand its re- 
ward in heaven. This will be a reward of grace 
and not of merit. We shall not be rewarded on 
account of our works, but according to our works. 
The sole and sufficient ground of our salvation, of 
our pardon and acceptance before God, must al- 
ways be the merit of what Christ did and suffered 
in our stead. " Other foundation can no man lay 
than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus." 
But it has pleased God, after that we are saved 
through grace, to bestow upon all who seek to 
do good to others some testimonial of His appre- 
ciation of that which has been done. Not the 



264 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 



smallest act of Christian kindness and courtesy 
will escape His attention, nor fail of His reward. 

But in making this distribution of rewards He 
teaches us that He will be guided by the law of 
due proportion. That is, He will reward every 
man according to the good he hath wrought since 
he was saved. To the servant who had gained, 
with one pound, ten pounds, He said : " Well 
done, thou good servant: because thou hast been 
faithful over a very little, have thou authority 
over ten cities." To the servant who had gained 
five pounds, He said : "Be thou also over five 
cities." (Luke 19: 17 and 19.) It may be that 
by doing this good with their Lord's pounds, each 
became developed in capacity for enjoying just 
so much of the bliss and glory of heaven. All 
will be happy there, but all will not be prepared 
to take in and enjoy the same amount or degree 
of happiness. As Matthew Henry quaintly puts 
it : " All cups will be full alike, but all cups will 
not be large alike." Some by spiritual exercise 
in doing good will have developed a larger capa- 
city for seeing and enjoying the glory of heaven. 
All cups of happiness will be full to overflowing, 
but each will be large or small according to the 
effort put forth after the call came to enter the 
kingdom and go work in the vineyard. 

Still further, God will be glorified by the good 
works of His people. Of course nothing can ever 
be added to the essential glory of God, because 
from all eternity He has been infinite in glory and 



GOOD WORKS 265 

in all of His matchless attributes. What is meant 
is that by good works men can show forth the 
praise and glory of their God. They can magnify 
their God and make Him to be seen to be holy 
and merciful and good and kind in the grace which 
He hath bestowed upon them and caused to shine 
out through their lives to enable others to see the 
beauty of His salvation and the glory and power 
of His work of grace in their hearts and on their 
lives. Hence the directions of His Word: 
" Shew forth the praises of Him who hath called 
you out of darkness into His marvelous light." 
" Let your light so shine before men that they 
may see your good works and glorify your Father 
which is in heaven." Men cannot see God, but 
they may see His glory reflected in His works, 
whether those works be the hills and mountains 
or the lives and conduct of those who are His 
workmanship in Christ Jesus. These all shine in 
the reflected light of the great Sun of righteous- 
ness. As the moon catches up the glory of the 
sun, when that is beyond our vision, and reflects 
back its glory upon earth, so believers receive into 
their souls something of His glory and let it shine 
out through their lives that " men may see their 
good works and glorify their Father which is in 
heaven." (Matthew 5:16.) Believers can at 
least spread abroad the rays of light and glory 
which fall upon them from their Sun. They can 
thus widen and enlarge the circle in which the rays 
of God's declarative glory shine. 



266 



THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 



It is worth our effort and care, then, to make 
honest and earnest effort to maintain good works 
before our fellowmen. If by good works we can 
give to our own hearts a comfortable assurance 
that we are God's children; if we can thus com- 
mend the cause of Him whom we love so well; if 
we can benefit our fellowmen and glorify our God 
by doing good in the world ; then surely we should 
strive with all of our hearts to do all the good 
we can while the days are going by. As we would 
be true to ourselves, true to the cause of Christ, 
true to our fellowmen and true to our God, let us 
be careful to maintain good works. 

Let us not fail to consider the result of the 
neglect to show such kindnesses as are described 
under the expression " good works." If you will 
turn to the close of the twenty-fifth chapter of 
Matthew you will find that Christ, who is to be 
our final Judge, has forewarned us that the failure 
to have done these little acts of kindness and 
mercy toward the poor and the needy will be 
enough to shut one out of heaven and to shut him 
up in the prison house of the lost. The Savior 
does not represent men as failing of an interest 
in the kingdom of heaven merely because they have 
been guilty of great and heinous transgressions, 
but even for their failures to do the kindnesses 
they might have done to His representatives on 
the earth. " Then shall He say also to them on 
the left hand, ' Depart from me, ye cursed, into 
everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his 



GOOD WORKS 267 

angels ; for I was an hungered and ye gave me no 
meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me no drink; I 
was a stranger and ye took me not in; naked and 
ye clothed me not ; sick and in prison and ye vis- 
ited me not.' Then shall they also answer Him, 
saying, ' Lord when saw we thee an hungered, or 
athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in 
prison, and did not minister unto Thee? ' Then 
shall He answer them, saying, ' Verily I say unto 
you, inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least 
of these, ye did it not to Me.' And these shall 
go away into everlasting punishment: but the 
righteous into life eternal." (Matthew 25 : 41-45.) 



CHAPTER XXIV 

ASSURANCE 

Is it possible to know that we are Christians 
and to be sure that we are heirs of eternal life? 
Extreme answers have been given to this question. 
Some contend that it is impossible to decide this 
question till we awake in the eternal world. Ac- 
cording to this view, we must walk in spiritual 
darkness during our entire earthly pilgrimage. 
" It would be presumptuous to claim a title to 
the heavenly inheritance." They admit the su- 
perior value of spiritual blessings and they cannot 
deny the fidelity of Him who hath promised eternal 
life to them that believe on Him. Still they fear 
to claim any degree of certainty as to their en- 
trance into the promised inheritance. They hope 
that they will at last know that blessedness, but 
they hesitate to claim that they know it. On the 
other hand, there are those who not only claim 
to know as to their Christian hope, but insist that 
everyone who has been born into the kingdom of 
God must be fully assured of that fact. They 
make assurance an essential element of faith. 
They reject utterly the idea that one may be a 
Christian without knowing that he is a child of 
God and an heir of heaven. 



ASSURANCE 269 

The truth probably lies between these extremes. 
The Bible clearly teaches that everyone who be- 
lieves on the Son of God hath everlasting life. It 
teaches that it is the privilege of every child of 
God to come to a comfortable degree of assurance 
that he is in a state of grace and that he shall be 
kept by the power of God through faith unto sal- 
vation ready to be revealed at the last day. But 
one may be a Christian without having sufficient 
evidence to put it beyond all doubt that he has 
passed from death unto life. The apostle John, 
addressing those whom he recognized as fellow 
Christians, uses language which plainly implies 
that some of them had not yet attained this assur- 
ance, but that it was within their reach and that 
he had written to them to aid them in arriving at 
that happy stage of Christian experience. 
" These things have I written unto you that be- 
lieve on the name of the Son of God ; that ye may 
know that ye have eternal life." (I John 5: 13.) 
They had believed on the Son of God, and there- 
fore were saved. They were real, true Christians, 
and yet they had not that degree of assurance 
which John knew they might have, and hence he 
wrote to them that he might help them to attain 
unto that assurance. It was their privilege to 
know that they were Christians and that they 
were already in possession of the beginnings of a 
life which should last to all eternity. Hence he 
wrote to them and called their attention to the 
tests and means by which they might cease to 



no THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

have doubt on so important a matter. These 
same things should prove of service to Christians 
of all ages and of all lands in enabling them to 
know that they have eternal life. By things writ- 
ten in this Word and by effects of grace upon the 
heart, by the Word, and by the Spirit, all may 
know when they are in a state of grace and when 
they are heirs of the blessings of eternal life. 
That such an assurance is attainable is evident 
from the fact that we are commanded to seek it. 
When God issues a command it is our duty to 
obey. If we seek to obey, we may expect that along 
with the command will come the strength to obey. 
The man with the withered hand had no power in 
himself to stretch forth his hand, but Christ gave 
the command, and along with the command the 
ability to obey. The command was to the man a 
pledge that in obeying the blessing of renewed 
health would come to him — that the Savior would 
not mock his infirmity, but would bestow upon him 
the ability to obey. Hence when he sought to 
obey, he found the strength to obey. He 
stretched forth his hand whole as the other. 
So a command from God is frequently a pledge 
from God of a blessing He is about to bestow. 
When we find God directing His people to seek to 
know their spiritual state before Him, we may 
expect Him to crown the effort with success. 
Listen to Him as He bids you, " Examine your- 
selves whether ye be in the faith." (II Corinthi- 
ans 13 : 5.) " Give diligence to make your calling 



ASSURANCE 271 

and election sure." (II Peter 1 : 10.) Examine 
and prove yourselves by the application of the 
Scriptural tests, that you may know that you have 
been called of the Spirit and that you have ac- 
cepted that call and so are in a state of grace, 
that you are in the faith and that you are assured 
of your calling and election of God, " chosen in 
Him unto salvation." In other words, God had 
expressly laid upon you the duty of seeking to 
know that you are numbered among His people 
and that you are heirs of eternal life. God would 
not hold up for your acceptance such blessings 
and privileges unless it were His will to bestow 
them in answer to earnest prayer and seeking. 
" Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to 
you." Then shall we know if we follow on to 
know the Lord." (Amos 6:3.) If you will seek 
to know God and to hold communion with 
Him, you will learn to know Him better and bet- 
ter, and you will receive fuller and fuller mani- 
festations of His presence and blessing until there 
will spring up within your heart that filial spirit 
whereby you will be able to say, " Abba," Father. 
The fact that God has given in His Word tests 
by which you may try your spiritual condition 
before Him is an evidence that you may find out 
whether you are in the faith. One of these tests 
is love to God. He describes the natural, unre- 
newed mind as enmity to God and as not subject 
to His law. If, therefore, love for God has sprung 
up in the heart, it must be because that heart has 



272 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

been changed. Hence it is written, " Everyone 
that loveth is born of God," and " We love Him 
because He first loved us." If there be love in 
your heart for God, you have passed from death 
unto life, you are a child of God and an heir of 
heaven. 

Love to our fellow Christians is another test of 
our being in a state of grace. It is written, " We 
know that we have passed from death unto life 
because we love the brethren." (I John 3:14.) 
As children of the same family are bound to each 
other by ties of natural affection, so children of 
God are bound to each other by spiritual ties, 
strong and tender. They love each other accord- 
ing as they recognize in each other the image of 
their heavenly Father. They are bound to each 
other as those who have been redeemed by the 
same Savior, as those contending against the same 
spiritual enemies, as those enlisted in the same 
great cause, journeying towards the same heav- 
enly home, and loving and serving the same great 
King. " By this shall all men know that ye are 
my disciples, if ye have love one to another." 
(John 13:35.) 

Still another test by which we may decide 
whether we are true disciples of Christ is love for 
the Word of God. This Word is a revelation of 
the will and character of God. If we love God, 
we will love His Word. If we love His people, 
we will love the messages which He sends to them. 
If we love His Son, we will love the Word which 



ASSURANCE 273 

testifies of that Son. Here are treasured up the 
precious promises which God hath given to His 
people. Here is revealed to them Christ who is 
the Way, the Truth and the Life. Here are set 
forth the privileges and duties of the children of 
God, and here are described the blessings which 
are in store for them in heaven. Here are re- 
corded the letters from the heavenly Father to 
His children. No wonder, then, that love of 
God's Word has ever been a mark of the children 
of God. The inspired Psalmist sings the praises 
of the Word of God and declares his love for it 
in glowing terms. " The statutes of the Lord are 
right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of 
the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; the fear 
of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judg- 
ments of the Lord are true and righteous alto- 
gether. More to be desired are they than gold, 
yea, than much fine gold ; sweeter also than honey 
and the honey comb." 

Love for the ordinances of God's house will like- 
wise be felt by every true child of God. David 
said: "I was glad when they said to me, 'Let 
us go up unto the house of the Lord.' I would 
rather be a door keeper in the house of my God 
than to dwell in the tents of the wicked." It is 
here that God has promised His special presence 
and blessing. It is here He meets with His people 
and pours out richly His blessings. It is here 
His Word is read and explained. It is here His 
praise is sung. It is here we bow before His 



274 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

throne in prayer. It is here — in the sacraments 
— that Christ and the benefits of the new cove- 
nant are represented, sealed and applied to be- 
lievers. It is here they hold communion with God 
and with each other. If you love the ordinances 
of God's house, you have an evidence that you are 
under the influence of the love of the God whom 
you worship in His sanctuary. 

The fruits of the Spirit will evince the life of 
God in the soul. These are given as " love, joy, 
peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 
meekness, temperance." (Galatians 5: £2.) 
These do not spring up in the human heart spon- 
taneously. Their presence is an evidence of spir- 
itual life and grace. The good seed has fallen 
into the heart, and God's Spirit has blessed it and 
caused it to yield spiritual fruit. The presence 
of this fruit is the proof and evidence of the new 
life that is there. 

Men may judge of their spiritual state by the 
general tenor of their lives. Not only are there 
fruits of the Spirit in the heart, but in the daily 
life of every true believer. The rule laid down by 
the Savior was this : " By their fruits shall ye 
know them." " Ye are my disciples if ye do what- 
soever I command you." Faith in the soul 
" works by love, purifies the heart and overcomes 
the world." While no merely human life is per- 
fect, yet every human life into which has been in- 
troduced the principle of grace will manifest the 
presence of that grace by outward conduct. Men 



ASSURANCE 275 

will take knowledge of such as give evidence of the 
presence of grace in the heart by their outward 
lives, that they have been with the Lord. They 
will know that they have walked with Jesus till 
they have caught His spirit and learned to strive 
day by day to imitate His example. 

Then, too, the Holy Spirit will bear witness with 
our spirits that we are the children of God. 
There will be such an influence exerted by the 
Spirit over our hearts that there will spring up 
there a filial spirit — a spirit similar to that which 
a child feels toward his own father — so that we 
can look up with love and faith in God and claim 
and call Him our Father. " The Spirit itself 
beareth witness with our spirits that we are chil- 
dren of God." " If children, then heirs ; heirs of 
God, and joint-heirs of Christ," " to that inherit- 
ance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth 
not away, reserved in heaven " for all them that 
love Him. 

There are numerous Scriptural examples of 
those who came to enjoy this full assurance as to 
their acceptance with God. David said, " I shall 
behold Thy face in righteousness." Job said, " I 
know that my Redeemer liveth." Paul said, " I 
know in whom I have believed and am persuaded 
that He is able to keep that which I have com- 
mitted unto Him against that day." And John 
wrote, " These things have I written unto you 
that believe on the Son of God that ye may know 
that ye have eternal life," 



276 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

When we are directed to seek this assurance, 
when tests are laid down by which we may decide 
whether we be in the faith, and when examples are 
set before us for our imitation in seeking and find- 
ing this blessing, there is left no reasonable ground 
for doubt as to whether this assurance can be at- 
tained. Such assurance is certainly desirable for 
our comfort and usefulness. We should wish to 
be sure that we are on the way to heaven. We 
should be sure that we have trusted in the only 
foundation that will stand in the day of storm. 
We should be sure that Christ is our friend and 
that He will be our advocate in the final day of 
trial. We should all desire to read our titles 
clear to mansions in the sky. If desirable and 
attainable, then it should be sought earnestly and 
perseveringly. Why should we go mourning all 
of our days when we might be rejoicing in the 
Lord continually? Why should we not rejoice 
and be glad if we have the assurance that we are 
the children of the heavenly King? If we have 
not such an assurance, should we not seek it with 
all earnestness and zeal? We should seek for it as 
the lost man seeks for the way, as the condemned 
man for pardon, as the sick man for health, and 
as the poor man seeks wealth. We should seek it 
before all earthly blessings and privileges. " Seek 
first the kingdom of God and His righteousness," 
and all else needful shall be added. 



CHAPTER XXV 

PERSEVERANCE 

If it be important to know that you are a child 
of God, it is no less important to be sure that you 
will continue to be a member of the family of God 
until you come into possession of the inheritance 
He hath promised to His children. If it be es- 
sential to your joy and comfort to know that you 
have begun the journey that leadeth unto life eter- 
nal, it is no less necessary that you have a good 
assurance that you shall, at last, arrive in the 
celestial city. There are some who hold that you 
can never know whether you will reach heaven un- 
til you are there, and who hurl anathemas at those 
who deny that God's children may be lost on the 
way. God's Word must decide here, as elsewhere, 
as to the truth on this subject. It seems clearly 
to teach that " they who have been really called 
into the kingdom and regenerated by the Spirit 
can neither totally nor finally fall away from the 
state of grace; but shall certainly persevere 
therein to the end and be eternally saved." 
(Question 79, L. C.) This does not mean that 
real Christians may not fall into sin and become 

guilty of backsliding, for the mournful examples 
377 



278 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

from David to Peter and from Peter to this day, 
clearly prove that Christians may and do thus sin. 
Nor does it mean that some who unite with the 
Church do not go back to sin and the world and 
are finally lost, for we are expressly taught that 
there are those who go out from among God's peo- 
ple because they are not of them, and who go like 
Judas to their own place because like him they 
were devils from the beginning. What is meant 
is that real Christians, those in whose hearts God 
hath begun the work of grace, though they may 
become guilty of sins and inconsistencies, yet they 
will never totally and finally apostatize and be 
lost, but that they will turn from their sins and, 
like David and Peter, have the work of grace car- 
ried on in their hearts till they come at last into 
the full enjoyment of the blessings of heaven. 

What are the Scriptural evidences of this 
precious truth? The purpose of God on this sub- 
ject is so clear and definite that it is difficult to 
understand how there can be any doubt on this 
subject in the minds of those who believe the 
Bible. Christ says, " My sheep hear My voice 
and I know them and they follow Me, and I give 
unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, 
neither shall any pluck them out of my hand." 
(John 10: 27-29.) " And this is the Father's will 
that hath sent Me, that of all which He hath given 
Me I shall lose nothing, but should raise it up at 
the last day." (John 6: 39-40.) " All that the 
Father hath given Me shall come to Me ; and him 



PERSEVERANCE 279 

that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out." 
(John 6:37.) Could language be stronger, 
clearer or more explicit? It is the will of the 
Father that all the Father hath given the Son 
shall come to Him, and of the Son that " him that 
cometh unto Him He would in no wise cast out," 
and of the Father and Son that of all that vast 
number given to Him and coming to Him, He 
should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the 
last day. " And we know that all things work 
together for good to them that love God, to the 
called according to His purpose." (Romans 
8:28.) This is the revelation of the will of God 
concerning those given to Christ, those coming to 
Christ and those called according to His purpose. 
Unless, therefore, God's purpose should fail, all 
true Christians must be brought at last into His 
kingdom of glory. 

The change wrought in man's character is so 
thorough that we might expect it to be permanent. 
So complete and radical is this change that it is 
compared to a new birth, a creation, a resurrec- 
tion. " Except a man be born again, he cannot 
see the kingdom of heaven." " You hath He 
quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins, 
and hath raised you up and made you to sit to- 
gether in heavenly places." When God exercises on 
man's behalf power that can be expressed only by 
comparing it to that wrought in creation, birth 
and resurrection, the presumption is that He will 
accomplish and bring to completion that which He 



280 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

hath undertaken. Until his nature hath under- 
gone that radical change by which man is begot- 
ten in the likeness of God, he cannot be recog- 
nized as a child of God. But when this change 
has once been wrought by the divine Spirit, then 
man is brought into the spiritual family of God 
and made an heir of God. " As many as re- 
ceived Him, to them gave He power to become the 
sons of God, which were born, not of blood, nor 
of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but 
of God." Unless man be created anew by some 
supernatural power, he can never see and enjoy 
the blessings of the kingdom of God. But when 
he is so recreated in Christ Jesus, he has given 
unto him a nature which will qualify him for en- 
trance into that kingdom of holiness. 

Unless man be raised up from his death in sin, 
he must forever remain under its power ; but when, 
by the grace of a divine Savior, the power of 
spiritual death hath been broken, man can walk in 
newness of life and come at last to enjoy fulness 
of life in heaven. The gospel provides for just 
such a resurrection and just such a creation. In 
the second chapter of Ephesians it is written: 
" God, who is rich in mercy for His great love 
wherewith He hath loved us, even when we were 
dead in sins, hath quickened us together with 
Christ, and hath raised us up together that in the 
ages to come He might show the exceeding riches 
of His grace in His kindness to us through Jesus 
Christ." When a man is introduced into the 



PERSEVERANCE 281 

kingdom of God by a new birth, a new creation 
and a resurrection from the dead, the change must 
be so mighty and so radical that there will be 
good ground to believe that it will be permanent 
— that Christ is formed in him the hope of glory. 
" He that hath begun a good work in you will 
carry it on until the day of Jesus Christ." The 
agent who works this change is so mighty and so 
wise and so good that we may rest assured that 
He will bring to completion that which He hath 
undertaken. He is none other than the divine 
Spirit. He is the almighty Being who brooded 
over the waters when our world was a chaos and 
brought order out of confusion. He is that al- 
mighty Being by whose power all souls were 
created. He is that all-powerful Being by whom 
Christ was raised from the dead. He it is who 
has undertaken this great work in behalf of each 
believer, and none . are so strong and malignant 
as to be able to thwart His plan and purpose. 

The atonement of Christ was so perfect and 
complete that all who trust in Christ will surely 
be owned and acquitted in the final day of trial. 
As they were fully and freely pardoned and ac- 
cepted when they first came to Christ, confessing 
their sins and pleading His merit, so in the day 
of judgment, when He, as their advocate, pleads 
their cause, confessing their sin and pointing to 
His suffering and death in their behalf, they will 
be openly owned and acquitted and welcomed into 
all of the privileges and honors of the kingdom 



282 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

of God. When the King's own Son pleads, the 
King will surely hear and answer the pleading. 
It was He who placed Himself in man's stead, to 
do and suffer all that the law and justice of God 
required. He obeyed that law perfectly. He 
paid its penalty fully. He encountered and con- 
quered all of the enemies to man's salvation. He 
overcame guilt and sin and Satan and death. 
" If when we were enemies we were reconciled to 
God through the death of His Son, much more, 
being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." 
He passed through death, and ever lives to make 
intercession for us at His Father's right hand 
and " Him the Father heareth always 1 " As our 
great high priest He laid the offering upon the 
altar when He gave Himself for us ; and as our 
great high priest He hath entered within the veil, 
there to plead our cause. Who can doubt the 
result of His intercession. He is thoroughly ac- 
quainted with the will of the Father. He knows 
perfectly all of the guilt and sin of man. He has 
a perfect acquaintance with all of the require- 
ments of the law. These He has already met 
fully and completely, and as an evidence of this 
has been released from the death He was paying 
in man's behalf and has been welcomed back to 
His place of honor and power at His Father's 
right hand in heaven. From that lofty throne 
He points to all He did and suffered for man, 
and asks of the Father in these words : " Father, 



PERSEVERANCE 283 

I will that they also whom Thou hast given Me be 
with Me where I am, that they may behold My 
glory which I had with Thee from the beginning, 
for Thou lovedst Me before the foundation of the 
world." In order to this, he prays that they 
may be kept from the evil, that they may be sancti- 
fied through the truth, that they may be made 
one, and that then they may be brought to Him- 
self in glory. The hope of persevering in grace 
is based not upon the fickle, sinful and imperfect 
heart of man, but upon the unchangeable purpose 
of God the Father, upon the mighty change 
wrought upon the dispositions of the soul by God 
the Spirit, and upon the perfect and infinite 
atonement and ever-prevalent intercession of God 
the Son. God the Father, God the Son and God 
the Holy Ghost unite their infinite wisdom and 
goodness with their almighty power in the work 
of bringing many redeemed sinners unto glory. 
Who shall thwart that purpose? Who shall keep 
out of heaven the soul whom God calls, renews, 
guides, keeps, and saves from sin and death and 
hell ? " What shall we say to those things ? If 
God be for us, who can be against us? He that 
spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up 
for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely 
give us all things. Who shall lay anything to 
the charge of God's elect? It is God that justi- 
fieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ 
that died; yea, rather that is risen again, who is 



284 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

even at the right hand of God, who also maketh 
intercession for us. Who shall separate us from 
the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress 
or persecution, or famine or nakedness or peril 
or sword? Nay, in all of these things we are 
more than conquerors through Him that loved us. 
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, 
nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor 
things present, nor things to come, nor height, 
nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able 
to separate us from the love of God, which is in 
Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:31-39.) 

What a comfort should this teaching be to the 
hearts of all of God's children! Amid all of the 
trials and sorrows and temptations of this life, 
the Christian may confidently look for deliverance 
and victory. In the storms of life he can hear 
the voice of that Savior who stilled the tempest 
saying unto him, " Be not afraid ; it is I." 
" Weeping may endure for a night, but joy Com- 
eth in the morning." " Be of good cheer ; I have 
overcome the world." " Be thou faithful unto 
death and I will give thee a crown of life." 

What a cause of thanksgiving and praise to 
the God of our salvation ! We were sinful and 
helpless and lost. He loved us and sent His son 
to seek and save the lost. The Son loved us and 
" gave Himself for us that He might redeem us 
from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a pecu- 
liar people zealous of good works." Out of love 
to God we should praise Him and serve Him all 



PERSEVERANCE 285 

of the days of our lives. The love of Christ 
should constrain us not to live unto ourselves, but 
unto Christ who died for us and rose again, and 
who " ever liveth to make intercession " for us. 



CHAPTER XXVI 
DEATH 

There are many things about death we cannot 
know till we pass through it. But there are some 
things concerning it that are clearly taught in 
the Word of God. One of the things about 
death which is taught, alike by experience and the 
Bible, is that we must die. Each of us may say 
with Job, " I know that Thou wilt bring me to 
death and to the house appointed for all living." 

The death referred to by Job is the separation 
of the soul from the body, which we call physical 
death. It is the cessation or suspension of the 
union that has existed between the spirit and the 
body. It is the death that brings us to the 
grave, " the house appointed for all living." It 
should be a matter of interest to everyone to en- 
quire, " What does the Bible teach us in regard to 
death? " For one thing, the Scriptures remind 
us frequently that death is an event which must 
come to all. " It is appointed unto men to die." 
" It is the house appointed for all living." The 
appointment is made for men in general, for the 
entire race, for men always and every where. 

The house appointed is " for all living." The 

286 



DEATH 287 

appointment is of God, and hence none can escape 
it except as He may will, for who can resist His 
power? It is true that in the past two or three 
were translated that they should not see death, 
and that God has promised to change the bodies 
of the saints which remain on earth at the coming 
of the Savior, that they may be made like the 
glorified body of Christ, but apart from these 
exceptions we have no reason to expect that a 
single member of our entire race shall escape 
death. 

Death — like Him who appointed it — is " no 
respecter of persons." It comes alike to all 
classes and conditions of men. It takes the infant 
from the mother's arms. It cuts down the strong 
young man and the fair young maiden. It calls 
the middle-aged man from the activities of busi- 
ness life and from the care of his family. It per- 
mits the aged man to lay down his long borne 
burden and rest with his fathers in the grave. 
All classes — the young and the old, the weak and 
the strong, the wise and the unwise, the rich and 
the poor, the prepared and the unprepared, the 
believer and the unbeliever — must at last answer 
the summons that calls them to the pale realms of 
death. All must leave the things of this world 
and come at last to " the house appointed for all 
living." 

Another teaching of the Bible is that death is 
the result of sin. Had there been no sin, there 
would have been no death. But for sin, there 



288 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

would have been no sickness, nor suffering, nor 
pain, nor separation of soul and body in the 
agonies of physical death. Death does not come 
to man by any arbitrary appointment of God, 
but as a judgment for sin. Man by sinning 
brings upon himself the penalty of his own dis- 
obedience. The Judge declares him to be guilty 
of death because of his sin. " By one man sin 
entered into the world, and death by sin, and so 
death passed upon all men for that all have 
sinned." (Romans 5: 12.) The law was broken, 
and the penalty has fallen on man because he 
disregarded the warning, " In the day thou eatest 
thereof, thou shalt surely die." Our great 
representative was clearly taught that the legal 
and moral status which he, by his obedience or 
disobedience, should secure for himself, he would 
likewise secure for all of his posterity. If he 
should obey, he would be confirmed in holiness, 
and he and they should continue to enjoy the 
blessings of God's children to all eternity; but 
that if he disobeyed, he should forfeit all right 
and title to the favor of God and bring himself 
and his descendants into sin and misery. He 
chose the way of sin and so must suffer its pen- 
alty. Did he bring himself under the penalty by 
his sin and disobedience? So did he bring his 
children. Did he lose from his soul the image of 
God? So did he bring it to pass that not one of 
all of his descendants should be born in the image 
of God, but that they should all come into the 



DEATH 289 

world with his sinful likeness. Did he become a 
child of wrath through sin? So did they, for 
" we are all children of wrath." Did he become 
subject to all of the evils of this life, to death it- 
self and all of the pains of hell forever? So did 
they. Sin, then, it is that hath wrought the ruin 
of man. Sin brings death and all of our woes. 
" Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." 
" The wages of sin is death." 

Even God's people are required to go up to the 
privileges of the redeemed through the gateway 
of death. It is true that Christ hath purchased 
for them deliverance from the curse of the law, 
and a title to life eternal, yet, according to the 
terms of the covenant, believers are required to 
pass through death to the life eternal. . God 
might have translated them at once to heaven, 
but for wise reasons He does not do this, but re- 
quires them to pass through a greatly modified 
death — a death from which the sting of sin hath 
been extracted, a death which has been changed 
from a curse into a means of chastisement and a 
death which has been robbed largely of its terrors 
by the fact that Christ gained the victory over it 
and sanctified it for the service of those who put 
their trust in Him by making it a means of grace 
to them while here and a means of entrance into 
glory when they are called away from here. Still 
it is true that even God's children would have 
never known death had they never known sin. 
They must follow Him who tasted death for them 



290 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

through the grave up to the glory which He hath 
in store for them. 

Again, we are clearly taught that the soul of 
man will continue to live in a conscious, active 
state, after the separation from the body. Many 
of the greatest minds of the past have regarded 
even the rational arguments for the immortality 
of the soul sufficient to beget a very strong prob- 
ability of the soul's continued existence after 
death. The Bible testimony on this subject 
makes it certain to all who receive its authority 
that man's soul will survive the shock of death, 
and live and know beyond the grave. The people 
of all races and lands and times have believed in 
the immortality of the soul, and there must, there- 
fore, be some solid foundation upon which so uni- 
versal a hope must rest. God either taught their 
ancestors this great truth and they handed it 
down, or else he bestows upon each soul the power 
to entertain this hope. 

Philosophers teach that not a particle of mat- 
ter can be destroyed. You can change its form 
and the combination of its elements, but you can- 
not cause them to cease to exist. You can burn 
a stick of wood, but if you could gather up all of 
the smoke and water and ash that came from it 
you would find that nothing had been destroyed 
but the combination of particles. How much 
more, then, have we the right to infer the inde- 
structibility of the spiritual part of man, which 
is one and indivisible. 



DEATH 291 

The soul has powers and capacities capable of 
indefinite development and improvement, and 
should have a sphere and opportunity for such 
development. As a profound thinker once said, 
" God has ordained that all things shall fulfill the 
ends for which they exist." Now two ends for 
which man exists are that he may develop to their 
highest degree all of his powers and faculties, and 
that he should glorify the God who made him. 
Life is too short and circumscribed to fulfill these 
ends satisfactorily, and hence there must be some 
future state in which the work begun here may be 
completed.. If you see a man planting a great 
number of fruit trees close together in a small 
place, you conclude from your knowledge of the 
nature of the trees that they are to be trans- 
planted to a larger place where they shall have 
opportunity to grow and develop and bear fruit. 
The soul of man is the scion, in the nursery here 
on earth, which is to be transplanted to the gar- 
den of God in the eternal world, that there it may 
have time and opportunity to grow and develop 
and bear fruit to the glory of God who made it. 

Conscience points forward to a time and a Per- 
son before whom an account must be rendered of 
all the deeds done in the body. Horace, the poet, 
said that " fear made the gods," but one wiser 
than Horace said, " But who made fear? " Why 
should man fear the result of his conduct in the 
future if there be no future ? And why fear if 
there be no law and no Judge and no day of reck- 



292 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

oning? Surely these premonitions are the voice 
of God, whispering in our souls and prophesying 
the future day of retribution, when we shall be re- 
quired to give an account of the deeds done in the 
body. 

Then, too, the unequal distribution of rewards 
and punishments in this world leads us to expect 
another world in which all of the inequalities of 
justice shall be made even. " Shall not the Judge 
of all the earth do right? " Would it be right 
to let the wicked go unpunished forever? Would 
it be right for the innocent to continue to suffer 
and the robber and the murderer to escape the 
punishment due his sin? It must be that at some 
time in the future all men must stand before the 
judgment seat of God, that they may receive at 
His hands according to their deeds. Justice de- 
mands what conscience tells men he should fear. 

When we turn to the Bible, the light is clear 
and distinct. Job, who lived long before the 
Light of the world came in human form, said: 
" I know that my Redeemer liveth and that He 
shall stand at the latter day on the earth ; and 
though after my skin worms destroy this body, 
yet in my flesh I shall see God ; whom I shall see 
for myself, and mine eyes shall see, and not an- 
other." Later on, Christ brought life and im- 
mortality to light, and declared in plain terms, 
and emphatic as plain, when He was about to 
leave this world by the gateway of death, " I go 
to prepare a place for you, and if I go and pre- 



DEATH 293 

pare a place for you, I will come again, that where 
I am, there may ye be also." " Because I live, ye 
shall live also." " He that believeth on Me hath 
everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last 
day." Taught by the inspiration of God, Paul 
wrote, " If the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus 
from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up 
Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mor- 
tal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you." 
(Romans 8:11.) In the closing verses of the 
twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew Christ represents 
the wicked as going away into " everlasting pun- 
ishment," and the righteous into " life eternal." 
The souls, both of the righteous and of the un- 
righteous, are there represented as continuing in 
conscious existence throughout all eternity. . 

We are authorized to believe that the souls of 
believers are at death made perfect in holiness and 
that they do then pass immediately into glory. 
It is written, " Without holiness no man shall see 
the Lord," and it is said that " nothing that defil- 
eth or maketh unclean shall enter therein." God 
would not receive the unholy into companionship 
with Himself, and they would not be prepared to 
enjoy the blessings of the holy abode of God. 
And yet the Savior promised to the penitent thief 
that that very day he should be with Him in Para- 
dise. Paul said, " To be away from the body is 
to be at home with the Lord." And the apostle 
John wrote, " I heard a voice from heaven say, 
* Write, " Blessed are the dead which die in the 



294 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

Lord from henceforth that they may rest from 
their labor ; and their works do follow them." ' " 
And when he saw the multitude of the redeemed 
in heaven and asked, " Who are these and whence 
came they ? " the answer came back, " These are 
they that have come out of great tribulation and 
have washed their robes and made them white in 
the blood of the Lamb." Evidently, therefore, to 
prepare His people for the new sphere into which 
they are represented as being introduced at the 
moment of death, they are made perfectly holy 
and then welcomed into Paradise, the third or 
highest heaven. Thus shall they be satisfied when 
they awake with His likeness and are called into 
His presence with exceeding great joy. 

On the other hand, the souls of the wicked pass 
at once to the prison house of Satan and his 
angels. Christ warned men that if they would 
not believe on Him, they should die in their sins 
and go into the outer darkness where there should 
be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. He 
says expressly that Judas, who was a devil from 
the beginning, " went to his own place " ; and of 
all the finally impenitent He says, " These shall go 
away into everlasting punishment." In that dark 
abode they are in full possession of all of their 
faculties. He bids the rich man to remember that 
he in his lifetime had his good things while Laz- 
arus had evil things, but that now he was tor- 
mented while Lazarus was comforted. 

Still further, the Bible teaches us that this sep- 



DEATH 295 

aration between the righteous and the wicked is 
the result of the character and conduct of men in 
this life. It is a great law in the spiritual world 
that " whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also 
reap." " He that soweth to the flesh shall of the 
flesh reap corruption; and he that soweth to the 
spirit shall of the Spirit reap life eternal." In 
the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew Christ points 
out the two classes into which men divide them- 
selves — the wise and the foolish virgins ; they 
who improved their talents and they who improved 
them not ; they who ministered to His representa- 
tives and they who neglected to do so. Then He 
adds those fearful words, "These shall go away 
into everlasting punishment ; but the righteous 
into life eternal." According to the sides they 
espoused, and according to their faith or lack of 
faith as shown by their lives, should be their des- 
tiny. 

This allotment to everlasting death and to life 
eternal is to take place immediately after death 
and is to be fixed, final and eternal. It was " this 
day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise." It was 
" from henceforth " that the righteous were to be 
blessed. To die is to be with Christ for the right- 
eous. To go to their own place will be the end 
of all who, like Judas, betray the Master or re- 
fuse to put their trust in Him as the only Savior 
from sin. " I said, therefore, unto you, ' Ye shall 
die in your sins.' For if ye believe not on Me, 
ye shall die in your sins." To die in one's sins is 



296 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

to sink into the abode of the sinful and the lost. 
To all such as reject finally the offer of the Sav- 
ior to redeem them, He says, " Whither I go ye 
cannot come." To them He says as to Dives, 
" Besides all this, between us and you there is a 
great gulf fixed so that they which would pass 
from hence to you cannot. Neither can they pass 
to us that would come from thence." (Luke 
16 : 26.) That is a fearful verdict the Lord sends 
back from heaven concerning the estate of men in 
the hour of death and judgment. " He that is 
unjust, let him be unjust still; and he that is 
filthy, let him be filthy still; and he that is right- 
eous, let him be righteous still; and he that is 
holy, let him be holy still." (Revelations %% : 11.) 
They will then have reached a period in their 
moral history when their destiny shall be fixed 
and unalterable. They will sink or ascend ac- 
cording to the characters they have acquired. 
They will gravitate toward their own place — to 
a home in heaven or to a prison house in hell. 

Trust not to a promise of future repentance 
nor to a second probation. Christ said concern- 
ing those who demanded signs and visions in His 
day, " If they believe not Moses and the prophets, 
neither will they be persuaded though one rose 
from the dead." So it may be said concerning 
those who demand a chance beyond the grave, if 
they will not believe the gospel and trust in Christ 
now, neither will they believe and repent then. 



DEATH 297 

Now the gospel invites them to all of the bless- 
ings of salvation. Now the " Spirit and the 
bride say * Come.' And let him that heareth say 
' Come.' And let him that is athirst come. And 
whosoever will, let him take of the water of life 
freely." There no gospel will be proclaimed. 
There the Spirit will cease to strive with man, and 
there no Christian friend can give the invitation. 
" Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now 
is the day of salvation." 

Prepare during this day for the night of death 
and for the awful realities of eternity. Do you 
ask how this preparation can be made and in 
what it consists? Repent of your sins and turn 
unto the Lord and He will have mercy on you and 
abundantly pardon you. " Believe on the Lord 
Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." He will 
clothe you with the robe of His perfect righteous- 
ness so that you may be a welcomed guest at the 
marriage feast. By careful, prayerful, earnest, 
consecrated living, seek constantly to show forth 
the praises of Him who hath called you out of 
darkness into light. Keep your lamp trimmed 
and burning, and the oil of His grace in your 
heart, that you may be ready when your Lord 
cometh that you may meet Him in joy and that 
He may say to you and to the thousands who love 
and serve Him, " Come, ye blessed of my Father, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the 
foundation of the world." Thus will you be 



298 THE .CHRISTIAN FAITH 

ready to say with Job, " I know that Thou wilt 
bring me to death and to the house appointed for 
all living," and with David, " Thou wilt guide me 
with Thy counsel and afterwards receive me into 
glory." 



CHAPTER XXVII 
THE RESURRECTION 

When we stand on the shores of time and see 
our friends pass out into eternity through the 
gateway of death, the Bible is the only book that 
can give us any comfort and consolation concern- 
ing their state and condition. It alone gives us 
clear and definite knowledge concerning the im- 
mortality of the soul, and it alone teaches us to 
expect a bodily resurrection. Christ brought life 
and immortality to light. He proclaimed Him- 
self to be the " Resurrection and the Life," and 
promised to raise up all those who put their trust 
in Him. " He that believeth on me hath ever- 
lasting life, and I will raise him up at the last 
day." 

The heathen nations had almost no idea of the 

resurrection of the body. The Egyptians held 

that, if they could preserve the body, the spirit 

might come again and reinhabit its old home; but 

if the body should crumble to dust, the spirit must 

either wander on and on forever or enter the body 

of some lower animal and find there a home in 

which it would live and suffer. The resurrection 

is altogether a revelation from God. It is a 
299 



300 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

precious revelation to a believer because he is 
authorized by it to hope for the resurrection of 
his own body and the resurrection of the bodies 
of his friends and kindred. He may then see 
again the loved forms of friends who went away, 
trusting in the Lord years ago. Hence the com- 
fort which the apostle points out concerning those 
who die believing in the Lord. " I would not have 
you ignorant, brethren, concerning them which 
are asleep, that ye sorrow not even as others which 
have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died 
and rose again, even so them also which sleep in 
Jesus will God bring with Him." Hence, also, the 
words of Jesus, " Marvel not at this ; for the hour 
is coming in the which all that are in their graves 
shall hear His voice and shall come forth; they 
that have done good unto the resurrection of life; 
and they which have done evil unto the resurrec- 
tion of condemnation." (John 5:28-29.) 

We should seek to understand the teaching of 
the Word concerning the resurrection of the dead. 
It is plain that we are taught in the Bible that the 
very same bodies from which our souls are sep- 
arated at death will be raised again from the dead. 
This does not mean that every particle of matter 
that now constitutes these bodies shall be included 
in the resurrection, but only such a part of the 
body, whether particle or germ, as shall be neces- 
sary to constitute them the same bodies in a true 
and literal sense. No one has ever yet been able 
to define very clearly bodily identity, and yet of 



THE RESURRECTION 301 

the fact of such identity there can be no doubt. 
It certainly cannot consist in the continued asso- 
ciation and relation of all of the particles of the 
body, for these are constantly changing, being 
lost and renewed in the wear and growth of the 
body. We are told by physicians that the par- 
ticles of our bodies change every few years, that 
a man at twenty-one has not a particle of matter 
in his body that made up that body when he was 
born, and yet no one has a doubt but that his 
identity has been maintained during all of these 
years. He is conscious that his material home, 
his body, with its limbs and members, has con- 
tinued to be associated with and related to his 
soul, and that while there have been many changes 
in the body, yet it has remained substantially the 
same. So, though our bodies should be greatly 
changed in the passage through death, there will 
be a real sense in which they will be recognized as 
the very same bodies our souls inhabited before 
death. The same almighty God who first formed 
the body of man is certainly capable of reforming 
it in such a way as to maintain its identity and 
yet so change it as to fit it for the new sphere in 
which it is to live after the morning of the resur- 
rection. Hence the language used with reference 
to the resurrected body plainly identifies it with 
the body in which we now live and have our being. 
" It " — the body — " is sown in weakness." 
" It " — the same body — " is raised in power." 
Christ would not be the redeemer of our bodies 



302 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

unless He redeemed from sin and death the very 
bodies which have been marked and marred by sin. 
Christ's resurrection is a type of ours, for it is 
called " the earnest " of ours. As His was lit- 
eral, and as His very body was raised from the 
dead and was seen and recognized by His friends, 
so will our very bodies be raised and be seen and 
known by those who knew us before death. 
Hence we are expressly taught that our bodies are 
to be raised up and " are to be made like unto 
Christ's glorious body." 

The change which takes place in the body thus 
raised to life will be such as to prepare it for the 
abode of the soul cleansed from all sin, and for 
the new surroundings into which it is to be intro- 
duced. The model after which the bodies of be- 
lievers are to be fashioned will be the glorified 
body of Christ. That, though the same was 
greatly changed so that it was not at once recog- 
nized, being noticed carefully, was seen to be the 
very body of the Savior. When Mary came to 
the tomb seeking for Jesus, the record shows that 
when she had looked into the sepulcher and found 
that his body was not there, she turned back and 
saw Jesus standing and knew not that it was 
Jesus till He called her by name. " Jesus said 
unto her, ' Mary ' ; she saith unto Him ' Rabboni 
— Master.' " The familiar voice, the gracious 
manner, revealed to her the Lord, her Friend and 
Savior. The two disciples on their way to Em- 
maus were joined by Jesus who talked to them 



THE RESURRECTION 303 

and asked them questions, but they did not at 
first recognize Him. But when He sat down to 
eat with them, He was made known to them " in 
the breaking of bread." There was something in 
His manner and bearing, in His voice and gesture, 
which revealed Him through the change that had 
come over Him. Christ's transfiguration was a 
prophecy of what His body should be when raised 
from the dead. At that time, " His face did 
shine as the sun and His raiment was white as the 
light " ; so in the resurrection day Christ's body 
shall be glorious and the bodies of all of His peo- 
ple shall be like His in glory and beauty. His 
body was so glorified that it was not easily and 
immediately recognized by those who had known 
Him, and } r et so alike that it was seen to be the 
same when the first surprise was over and when 
opportunity was given to examine its features ; so 
will it be when we meet the redeemed whom we 
have known on earth. They may be as superior 
in body as the diamond is to the charcoal, and so 
may not be recognized at a glance, but they will 
be so the same that we shall know them by some 
appearance or trait or feature which they bore 
when upon earth. At the Laymen's Convention 
in Birmingham I met a classmate whom I knew 
and loved in College but whom I had not seen since 
we were boys. At first I did not know him, so 
great was the change which had come over him, 
and yet when I looked more carefully I saw in his 
eyes and form and bearing much to reveal him as 



304 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the same friend I had known so well in the past. 
" It is sown in dishonor ; it is raised in glory." 
It dies with the marks of sin upon it; it rises with 
the image of holiness upon it. The gloom of sin 
rested upon the countenance here; the glory of 
holiness will crown it there. As we have borne 
the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the 
image of the heavenly. The resurrection body is 
to be " incorruptible." In its natural state it 
was liable to dissolution and death, but in its 
spiritual condition it shall be no longer liable to 
the power of death. " There shall be no more 
death," for " it is sown in corruption ; it is raised 
in incorruption." 

The resurrection body shall be vigorous and 
full of strength. Here the body is weak and liable 
to grow weary. Here it is frail and not immune 
from sickness. There the weary are at rest. 
There " the inhabitant shall no more say ' I am 
sick.' " There fresh and immortal vigor shall 
mark the bodies of the redeemed, for it is written, 
" It is sown in weakness ; it is raised in power." 

Still further, it shall be " spiritual." Here it 
is an animal body, moved and largely influenced 
by animal feelings and instincts, and these largely 
controlled and directed by a sinful nature " so 
that when we would do good, evil is present with 
us." There it will be a spiritual body, a body 
spiritualized, a body occupied and actuated by 
the spirit of man under the guidance and influ- 
ence of the Spirit of God. Even here the body 



THE RESURRECTION 305 

of the believer is spoken of as " the temple of the 
Holy Ghost," but sin still dwells in that temple 
and mars its beauty and introduces discord into 
its worship; but after death the Holy Spirit will 
assume full sway and control of His temple and 
every thought and feeling and desire of the soul 
shall be under the perfect and sweet influence of 
the Spirit of God. 

Concerning the condition of the bodies of the 
wicked after death little is said in the Word of 
God. Since they refused to accept God's pro- 
vision for cleansing their souls and glorifying 
their bodies, they must be left under the degrad- 
ing, deforming influence of sin. They must 
" awake to shame and everlasting contempt." 
They must be given up to the evil influences of 
sin and Satan. They must " go away into ever- 
lasting punishment prepared for the devil and his 
angels." Having rejected Christ and made alle- 
giance with Satan, they must share his fate. 

The Scriptural reasons which have led to a firm 
belief in the resurrection of the dead are many and 
strong. Such a resurrection is necessary to the 
complete victory of Christ over sin and Satan. 
Satan led man into sin and sin brought upon man 
death — death bodily, death spiritual, death 
eternal. Christ undertook to rescue and deliver 
man from sin and death and Satan. He under- 
took this work for the whole man, for the body as 
well as for the soul. He must, therefore, defeat 
Satan, destroy his work and redeem both soul and 



306 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

body from the power and dominion of sin and 
from the pains of death. Hence it was that He 
engaged in the contest with Satan and defeated 
him. Hence it was He cast out demons. Hence 
it was that " He died, the just for the unjust, that 
He might bring us unto God." Hence it was He 
went down into the grave and burst the bands of 
death and ascended to glory, " leading captivity 
captive and receiving gifts for men." Hence He 
came " that through death He might destroy him 
that had the power of death, that is the devil, and 
deliver them who through fear of death were all 
of their lifetime subject to bondage." (Hebrews 
2:14-15.) 

Such a resurrection is necessary to complete 
the salvation of man. To save the soul is impor- 
tant and will be glorious, but man's redemption 
can never be complete, nor Christ's work finished, 
till the bodies of all them that put their trust in 
Him shall have been rescued from the grave, 
raised up and made like to His own glorious resur- 
rection body. 

Justice demands that the bodies of the wicked 
be raised up that they may receive " according to 
the things done in the body " ; and that the bodies 
of the redeemed be raised up that they may re- 
ceive in the body the rewards purchased for them 
by the sufferings which Christ endured in His 
own body upon the cross. Christ's own resurrec- 
tion is given as a token and a pledge of the resur- 



THE RESURRECTION 307 

rection of all them that put their trust in Him. 
" Because I live, }^e shall live also." " If the 
Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead 
dwell in you, He that raised Christ from the dead 
shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His 
spirit that dwelleth in you." (Romans 8: 11.) 

Then we have the express statements of the 
Word of God to confirm our hope and strengthen 
our faith. Some of these have just been quoted, 
and others are so familiar that they will readily 
occur to your minds. Christ declared Himself to 
be the " Resurrection and the Life," and said 
expressly, " This is the will of Him that sent Me, 
that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth 
on Him, may have everlasting life ; and I will raise 
him up at the last day." (John 6:40.) "So 
when this corruptible shall have put on incor- 
ruption, and this mortal shall have put on im- 
mortality, then shall be brought to pass the say- 
ing that is written, ' Death is swallowed up in 
victory.' ' " Thanks be unto God which giveth 
us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 
What a comfort to God's people, both concerning 
their own resurrection and concerning that of 
their friends and kindred who have departed to be 
with Christ! They shall meet and know them 
after the resurrection day. With them they shall 
walk and talk and worship and serve the Re- 
deemer forever and forever. 

With what zeal and earnestness should all seek 



308 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

to have a part in the resurrection of the just? 
" Set your house in order." Seek an interest in 
Him who is " the Resurrection and the Life," and 
who hath promised to raise up everyone who puts 
his trust in him. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 
THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 

There was once a man arraigned before the 
Court of the Inquisition. He was told that it 
would be best for him to make a full and unre- 
served confession of all he had said and done. He 
began, but when he heard the sound of a pen run- 
ning rapidly over paper behind a curtain that 
hung near, he became silent, for he knew that his 
words were being taken down that they might be 
used against him in the future. With far greater 
fairness and justice God forewarns us that a 
record is being made of our thoughts and words 
and deeds, and that we must face that record at 
the judgment of the great day, for " God hath 
appointed a day in which He will judge the world 
in righteousness by that man whom He hath or- 
dained." 

The day. There is, then, to be a day of judg- 
ment. Some have wondered why there should be 
a general judgment when it is clearly the teach- 
ing of the Bible that each man's destiny is prac- 
tically decided when he dies — that then he goes 
at once to the place to which his sins doom him 

or to the place to which the Savior has purchased 
309 



310 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

for him a title. Such a judgment would not be 
necessary for God, for He knows from the begin- 
ning all of the sins of the lost and all of those 
claimed by Christ as the purchase of His suffer- 
ing and death. He will deal with perfect justice 
in all of the sentences which He passes, whether at 
death or in the final day of judgment. 

While we may not be able to know all of the 
reasons why such a judgment is necessary, there 
are some good reasons that must occur to every 
thoughtful student of the Word and of human life. 
The expectation of such a day will stimulate men 
to live in a proper manner and to prepare for the 
account which they must at last render before 
God. If men know that all of their thoughts and 
words and deeds will one day be made known to 
those for whom he hath the highest regard, how 
careful will he be that these thoughts and feelings 
and words and deeds be of such a character that 
he will not be ashamed of them. He will strive to 
think pure thoughts, to speak true words and to 
do kind acts. 

Such a judgment will also furnish an oppor- 
tunity to reveal to men the ultimate fruits of their 
sins, and so reveal to them the perfect justice of 
God in their punishment or the greatness of His 
mercy in their pardon. No one is able to measure 
the full extent of the evil influence of even one sin 
when it is first committed. Here is a man who 
speaks a profane or an impure word in the pres- 
ence of a child. There is the double evil influence 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 311 

on the soul of the speaker and upon the soul of 
the child. These he cannot fully measure. But 
this is only the beginning. That child grows up 
with his character influenced and colored by that 
word he heard. It found a congenial soil in his 
sinful heart and will bear fruit in his life. He 
will repeat that or a similar word to others, and 
they to others, and thus that one wrong word 
may go on spreading its baneful influence long 
after the first and second speakers are dead and 
gone. Down to the end of time the evil fruit will 
be borne, and it can never be known till the end 
of time how great and how evil that fruitage will 
be. And so with each and every sin which a man 
commits during all the days of his life. In the 
light of eternity men shall see and understand far 
better than at death how great and how far reach- 
ing has been the ruin wrought by their sins and 
hence how just is God in the punishment He will 
inflict upon all of those out of Christ and how 
infinite the mercy of God in the gift of His Son 
to save from such sin. Thus will the general 
judgment silence the mouths of all cavilers and 
magnify the glory of God in the punishment of 
sinners and in the salvation of the righteous. It 
is clear, whether we can understand all of the 
reasons or not, that the Scriptures teach that 
there will be such a general judgment, both of 
the just and of the unjust. In Ecclesiastes it is 
written, " God shall bring every work into judg- 
ment, with every secret thing, whether it be good 



312 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

or evil." (12:14.) In Acts 17:31 is recorded 
the passage already quoted : " God hath ap- 
pointed a day in which He will judge the world 
in righteousness by that Man whom He hath or- 
dained." Christ, in speaking of that day in the 
Gospel of Matthew, says, " When the Son of man 
shall come in His glory, and all of the holy angels 
with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of 
His glory; and before Him shall be gathered all 
nations." (Matthew 25:31, 32.) The apostle 
Paul says, " For we must all appear before the 
judgment seat of Christ." (II Corinthians 
5: 10.) And John, the beloved, writes: "I saw 
the dead, small and great, stand before God: and 
the books were opened: and another book was 
opened, which is the book of life: and the dead 
were judged out of those things which were writ- 
ten in the books, according to their works. And 
the sea gave up the dead that were in it ; and 
death and hell delivered up the dead which were in 
them: and they were judged, every man accord- 
ing to their works." (Revelations 20:12-13.) 
There will then be this great and terrible day of 
the Lord when He shall try the hearts of all men. 
That will be a great day because of the character 
of the judge, because of the vast multitudes to be 
tried, because of the revelations which shall be 
made and because of the sentence passed. It will 
mark the end of time, and the final doom of man. 
It will be a day of separations, a day of sorrow 
and despair, and yet a day of triumph and joy. 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 313 

The great day of judgment is coming at the time 
fixed and appointed by the Judge of all of the 
earth. 

The Judge will be the Lord Jesus Christ. God 
the Father hath appointed the day, but will give 
to His Son the honor of sitting as Judge. He is 
called " the Son of man " and " the Man ordained 
of God." In the gospel of John this remarkable 
language is used by Christ : " For the Father 
judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment 
unto the Son." (John 5:21-22.) It is becom- 
ing that Christ should have this honor. His at- 
tributes are such as to qualify Him for the office, 
and the work He hath done for the glory of His 
Father and for the salvation of man is such as to 
entitle Him to this public recognition before all 
the moral and spiritual world. His knowledge 
will enable Him to see and understand all of the 
sins and needs of those whom He is to judge. His 
holiness and justice are such that He will deal 
fairly and without any compromise with sin. His 
power is such that none can escape the awful reali- 
ties of that day. And yet His mercy is such that 
He will deal kindly and tenderly in so far as this 
can be done without violence to the law and jus- 
tice of Heaven. 

He gave up heaven and endured the sorrows of 
earth, the contradiction of sinners and the suf- 
fering of death to maintain the honor of God and 
secure the salvation of man. " Wherefore God 
hath highly exalted Him and given Him a name 



314 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

that is above every name, that at the name of 
Jesus every knee should bow and every tongue con- 
fess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the 
Father." (Philippians 2:9-11.) It is becoming 
that He should be the Judge as a reward for all 
He had done and suffered in order to reestablish 
the kingdom of righteousness and truth among 
men. Then, too, it is especially fitting that our 
mediator should be our judge. To stand before 
Jehovah in His naked spiritual being might so fill 
our hearts with terror and awe as to drive us away 
in dismay. But when we see the Judge, clothed 
in human form, and recognize Him as the very 
Savior who loved us and died and rose for us, we 
can the better stand before the judgment seat in 
that day. We shall be able to feel that He will 
represent our cause, and that through Him we 
shall be delivered from the wrath to come. 

What a contrast there will be between His posi- 
tion at that day and the position He occupied 
when upon earth ! Then He was in humility ; now 
in glory. Then He was a prisoner before an 
earthly tribunal; now He sits to judge the quick 
and the dead. Then He was despised and re- 
jected of men; now He is owned and confessed by 
a great multitude which no man can number. 
Then He was attended by a few humble followers ; 
now all of the holy angels of heaven attend Him, 
while all of the redeemed of earth and all of the 
wicked men of earth and wicked angels of heaven 
stand before Him to receive at His hands the sen- 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 315 

tence either of pardon and acceptance or of con- 
demnation and death. 

The persons to be judged then are all men and 
all the fallen angels who are said to be " reserved 
in chains of darkness unto the judgment of the 
great day." The quick and the dead are to be 
there. " Before Him shall be gathered all na- 
tions." " The dead, small and great, shall stand 
before Him." " Marvel not at this, for the hour is 
coming in the which all that are in their graves 
shall come forth, they that have done good unto the 
resurrection of life and they that have done evil 
unto the resurrection of damnation," — all of all 
races and kindreds and tribes and people ; all of all 
lands and countries ; all of every rank and age 
and condition ; all of all generations ; not merely 
the fifteen hundred millions that now live, but all 
of the thousands of generations that have lived; 
all who have died on sea or land ; all who have died 
in war and in peace; all who have been cut down 
by pestilence or famine or sword. The old and 
the young, the rich and the poor, the wise and 
the unwise, the prepared and the unprepared, 
the wicked and the righteous — all — all — 
every one of our race — shall be there. 

This judgment, while universal, will also be 
particular and individual. " So, then, everyone 
of us shall give account of himself unto God." 
No man can answer for another in that day ex- 
cept as Christ answers for His people. The 
father cannot answer for the son, nor the son for 



316 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the father. The husband cannot answer for the 
wife, nor the wife for the husband. Friend can- 
not answer for friend, nor neighbor for neighbor. 
" Every one of us must give account of himself to 
God." 

Of what shall we be judged? Of every thought 
of our minds, of every feeling of our hearts, of 
every word of our mouths and every deed of our 
lives. This is a great teaching of God's Word, 
corresponding with the wonderful teaching of 
conscience. That which conscience whispered, 
the Word loudly proclaims. That which man se- 
cretly feared, the Word plainly declares. " God 
shall bring every work into judgment with every 
secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be 
evil." 

The thoughts and intents of our hearts are the 
sources from which spring our actions, for " as 
a man thinketh, so is he ! " God sees these as the 
germs from which grow our actions. The botan- 
ist by his glass and by his knowledge can see in 
the seed the entire plant, root, stalk, leaf and 
branch; so does God see the full action in the 
thought of the mind and in the desire of the heart. 
For the words we speak, yea, for " every idle word 
shall we account in the day of judgment." Words 
have power and influence, and words once spoken 
have wings that carry them so fast and so far 
that we can never overtake them nor ever recall 
them. For every idle word, for every unkind 
word, for every untrue word and for every im- 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 317 

pure word we shall have to give an account in the 
day of judgment. For all the deeds done in the 
body must men give account in that final day of 
trial. " By their fruits ye shall know them." 
The good tree bringeth forth good fruit and the 
evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit, and we judge 
the tree by the fruit. So must man expect to be 
judged at the last day. For the deed itself, for 
its influence upon the person and for its influence 
upon others ; for all of its evil in its committal and 
for all the evil influence it may work down to the 
end of time, must we answer. 

For neglected opportunities and for omitted 
duties we must make answer at the bar of God. 
How many the golden opportunities that come to 
us along the way of life, and how many of them are 
neglected ! And how great the sorrow and re- 
morse which these neglected opportunities bring 
to the hearts of men. You have probably heard 
the incident related of John Randolph of Roan- 
oke when he came to die. He is said to have 
asked some one to write for him on a card the 
word " remorse." When that was done he bade 
him write it again. When that was done he re- 
quested him to write it a third time. When that 
wish was complied with he took the card in his 
thin, trembling fingers and said aloud, " Remorse ! 
Remorse ! Remorse ! " — sorrow for unimproved, 
neglected opportunities. He was a man of won- 
derful intellect and had enjoyed unusual advan- 
tages and might have wielded untold influence for 



318 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

good, but he felt that he had failed to seize and 
improve them and therefore sorrow and remorse 
filled his heart and made bitter his last moments 
on earth. You will recall the test which our Sav- 
ior represents Himself as applying at the judg- 
ment day. " Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of 
the least of these, my brethren, ye did it not unto 
Me." The failure to feed the hungry, give drink 
to the thirsty, to entertain the stranger, clothe 
the naked and visit the sick and imprisoned was 
an evidence that they did not have love in their 
hearts to God and man, and so He must deny 
them entrance into a kingdom which required trust 
of Christ and love to God and man as the quali- 
fications for admission. This was a test that 
could be applied alike by the rich and the poor. 
Those who have very little of this world's goods 
can divide their bread with the poor, give a cup 
of cold water to a fellow disciple for the sake of 
Him who, though He was rich yet, for our sakes 
became poor that we, through His poverty, might 
become rich. Even the poor can visit the sick 
and the prisoner, and share his shelter with his 
fellow traveller to the bar of God. It was the 
virgins who took no oil, the man who did no trad- 
ing with his talent, and the persons who did no 
act of kindness to the poor and needy who were 
to be condemned as lost at the last great day; 
and it was the virgins who took oil in their lamps, 
the men who improved their talents, and the per- 
sons who ministered to the poor and needy in 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 319 

Christ's name, who were welcomed into the rest 
that remaineth to the people of God. 

The rule by which they shall be judged is the 
will of God as made known to man. " The books " 
which contain this will shall be opened. In human 
courts there are statute books containing the law 
which are opened and read for the guidance of the 
judge and jury. So God's law will be appealed 
to to justify all of His decisions. The book of 
conscience will be opened. God hath written His 
law upon the hearts and consciences of man so 
that they can be appealed to to show cause why 
sentence should be passed upon those who have 
violated the dictates of this inward law. The 
soul's judgment as to the moral character of its 
own actions will support the judgment of God 
Himself, for conscience is the voice of God, dis- 
tinguishing between the right and the wrong and 
pointing forward to the final judgment of God 
to be passed upon the moral action of man. The 
book of the revealed law will be opened and by its 
teaching shall all who have heard it be tried. The 
thought and feelings and conduct of such men 
shall be laid along side the ten commandments, 
and by these shall the works of such men be tried. 
The Book of the gospel shall be opened and by it 
shall be tried all who have ever heard its joyful 
sound. The neglect or refusal of God's plan of 
salvation shall shut up all way of escape to men 
who have been guilty of such sin and folly. 

There shall be witnesses to testify against men 



320 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

— their own consciences, the persons whom they 
have wronged and led into sin. Satan, who 
brought them by the ways of death and darkness, 
shall then arise with fiendish delight to testify that 
they have sinned in this way and in that, to this 
extent and to that. But whatever may be for- 
gotten by conscience, by your fellow men, or even 
by Satan, shall be clearly brought to light when 
the book of God's remembrance shall be opened, 
for " God shall bring every work into judgment, 
with every secret thing, whether it be good or 
whether it be evil." In human courts the " record 
of a cause " is frequently sent up from a lower to 
a higher court. That record contains all of the 
facts and evidence. These are all laid before the 
court that the cause may be tried according to 
the law and evidence. So before the bar of God 
will be presented all of the evidence of the sin of 
man and he will be judged " out of the things 
which were written in the books according to his 
works." Then another book shall be opened, 
" which is the book of life." In that book are 
recorded the names of all who were given to Christ 
as a reward of His suffering and death — all who 
have been born of the Spirit ; all who have re- 
ceived and rested upon Christ alone for salvation 
as He was offered to them in the gospel. If any 
are found whose names are not in the book of life, 
they are condemned; but all whose names are 
written there are welcomed into the kingdom pre- 
pared for them from the foundation of the world. 



THE GENERAL JUDGMENT 321 

This, then, will be the result of the judgment. 
To the one class it will bring the message of wel- 
come into the blessings of the redeemed in heaven. 
To the other a sentence of " Depart from Me, ye 
cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil 
and his angels." Let sinners tremble in view of 
the judgment day, for " it is a fearful thing to 
fall into the hands of the living God " and to go 
away from the Savior into " the outer darkness 
where there shall be weeping and wailing and 
gnashing of teeth." Repent and turn to the Lord 
and w He will have mercy upon you, and unto 
our God, and He will abundantly pardon you." 

Let the righteous stand in awe and sin not. 
Let them trust in Christ, their advocate, and He 
will plead their cause and secure their pardon and 
acquittal. "Who is he that condemneth? It is 
Christ that died; yea, rather that is risen again, 
who is even at the right hand of God, who also 
maketh intercession for us." (Romans 8:34.) 
" Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? 
shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or 
famine, or nakedness, or peril, or a sword? . . . 
Nay, in all of these things we are more than con- 
querors through Him that loved us. For I am 
persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, 
nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, 
nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any 
other creature, shall be able to separate us from 
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our 
Lord." 



CHAPTER XXIX 
HEAVEN 

If you were about to leave your present home 
and move to a new country you would feel a deep 
interest in the character of that country. Its 
climate, its products, its people, its laws and 
customs, its government and ruler would all be 
subjects of the deepest interest to you. Your 
interest in heaven, the place to which you expect, 
before long to go, should be none the less real and 
deep. Since the Bible is the only source of in- 
formation we have concerning heaven, we should 
seek diligently to learn all it has to tell us about 
heaven. 

It is clearly revealed to us that heaven is a 
real place. The Savior said, " I go to prepare a 
place for you and if I go and prepare a place for 
you I will come again and receive you unto myself, 
that where I am there ye may be also." (John 
14:2,3.) 

The place is where Christ, with human body 

and soul, dwells. It is the home into which all 

of His people are to be gathered at last. It is 

" the better country " which the faithful of 

all ages have sought. It is " the land of 

322 



HEAVEN 323 

promise " which we hope to reach when we 
pass over the river of death. It is the " in- 
heritance " of the saints in light. It is the 
" paradise " of God, and the " kingdom " where is 
His throne and His glory. It is the dwelling 
place of God and holy angels and of all the re- 
deemed of earth. Into this blessed abode He 
promises at last to welcome all of His people of 
all lands and all ages when He shall say to them: 
" Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the king- 
dom prepared for you from the foundation of the 
world." 

Heaven is a place of life and conscious activity. 
It is a great mistake to suppose that death ends 
in an eternal sleep, or that heaven is a place of 
rest in the sense of ease, inactivity and laziness. 
The soul with all of its active powers and faculties 
passes into eternity without losing these. If 
death does not destroy the soul, then it does not 
impair the faculties of the soul, nor interfere with 
their activities. The mind must think, the heart 
must love, the will must act and the memory still 
recall the events that have passed away. Indeed, 
it is probable that the powers of the soul will be 
more active there than here. Here the weakness 
and weariness of the body hinder and interfere 
with the vigorous activity of the soul, but there it 
will be in a state where health and vigor will dis- 
tinguish every inhabitant, for there shall be no 
more sickness nor pain. The blessings of heaven 
are all summed up in the expression " eternal life," 



324 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

but life implies activity, growth and development, 
and eternal life involves endless activity. Hence 
we find that the redeemed are represented as 
" praising God," " serving God," and as resting 
not day or night. Their rest is not that of ease 
and inactivity but of employment in which there 
is no weariness, but variety, congeniality, and 
absence of hindrances and interruptions. Love 
ever impels them in the constant and delightful 
service which they render unto Him who loved 
them and gave Himself for them. 

Heaven is a holy place. It is written that 
" without holiness no man shall see the Lord." 
" Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see 
God." It is said, " Nothing that defileth or mak- 
eth unclean shall enter therein," and it is promised 
to the believer that he shall be satisfied when he 
awakes with the likeness of his Lord, and the 
blood-bought throng in heaven are described as 
those " who have washed their robes and made 
them white in the blood of the Lamb." 

Heaven is a place of perfect harmony. There 
the prayer of Christ will be fully answered, " That 
they may be one as we are one." All causes of 
discord and division between God and man will 
have been banished and all will be united in the 
bonds of a perfect and endless union with Christ 
as the Head and His people as His body. They 
will all bear His likeness, all have His mind, and 
all seek His glory. Love will prompt them to 
engage heartily and unitedly in the service of Him 



HEAVEN 325 

whom they have taken to be their All-comprehend- 
ing Good and before whom they all bow as before 
their All-disposing Lord. 

Heaven is described as a place beautiful beyond 
all power of thought or description. It is said 
to be a city " whose foundations are garnished 
with all manner of precious stones, whose gates 
are pearl, whose streets are of pure gold, through 
which flows the river of life, on whose banks grow 
the tree of life ; and in the midst of this city is the 
throne of God, and the glory of God is the light 
of it." This wonderful combination of the most 
beautiful objects of which we have any knowledge 
is presented to our minds to give us a glimpse of 
the beauty and grandeur and glory of the home 
which God is preparing for all them that look to 
Him for salvation. The spirit of this language 
is caught and expressed in that beautiful Scottish 
hymn, " The Palace of the King." The author 
names over the most beautiful things of earth, its 
mountains and hills, rivers and lakes, its fields and 
plains, its flowers and trees, and then declares that 
all of these, for beauty, do not touch the Palace 
of the King; then running over other beautiful 
things in nature, the sun and moon and stars, says 
" If these be so beautiful what must be the beauty 
of the Palace of the King? " No mind can con- 
ceive and no language describe the " things which 
God hath prepared for them that love Him." 

Heaven is a place of supreme happiness. All 
causes of sorrow are absent. Sickness is a con- 



326 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

stant source of sorrow and care in our earthly 
homes, but " the inhabitant of that land shall no 
more say, ' I am sick.' " Death is the king of 
terrors and he knocks at every door and brings 
sorrow into every earthly abode, but there " there 
shall be no more death, for they shall die no more, 
but shall be as the angels of God." 

The greatest source of sorrow is sin. It is the 
source of every sorrow and sigh, every sickness 
and every death in every time and every land. 
But in heaven there shall be no sin. The inhabit- 
ants of that land shall be renewed in the likeness 
of their Lord and Redeemer who is " holy, harm- 
less, undented and separate from sinners." There 
too they shall be forever exempt from the fear and 
the reality of eternal death, for Christ hath 
pledged to all who put their trust in Him eternal 
life with all of its blessings and rewards. This 
will insure not only the absence of all sources of 
sorrow but also all things which are necessary to 
the highest and purest forms of joy. Holiness 
of character will constitute one of the chief ele- 
ments of the happiness of heaven. To bear the 
image of God and to be conscious of no thought, 
no feeling, no desire which is out of harmony with 
the holy character of God will be a source of never 
ending joy and delight. 

The employments of heaven will be congenial 
and pleasant. We know not what these will be 
but we are warranted in believing that they will 
be worthy of the God who directs them, and suited 



HEAVEN 327 

to the redeemed characters of those who are to 
engage in them. We are sure that for minds made 
in the image of God there will be spread out for 
study and contemplation the boundless fields 
of truth; that for hearts thrilled with love and 
gratitude there will be revealed infinite objects 
and causes of love and affection; and that for 
wills brought under willing obedience to the will 
of God there will be abundant opportunities of 
loving, loyal service. We are expressly told that 
there " His servants shall serve Him," and we are 
taught that they praise Him day and night. 
There will be there an abundant supply of every- 
thing which can satisfy and please the tastes of 
those who have hungered and thirsted after right- 
eousness, for they shall be filled. " And they shall 
hunger no more neither thirst any more, for the 
Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall feed 
them, and God shall wipe away all tears from 
their eyes." 

There we shall meet and know the friends and 
kindred who have gone before and with them re- 
view the wonders of God's works of creation — 
providence and redemption. 

There we shall see the beauty and glory of 
God, and love and serve Him with all of our hearts. 
There we shall be under the hallowed influence of 
the Holy Spirit by whom we shall have been made 
meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, and 
there we shall see Him face to face, who loved us 
and gave Himself for us that He might redeem us 



328 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

from all iniquity and present us faultless before 
His Father with exceeding great joy. 

To crown all, heaven will be the eternal home 
of all of the redeemed. However beautiful and 
happy might be a home, it would not be suited to 
the full and final happiness of immortal souls un- 
less it were permanent and abiding. There are 
many beautiful homes on earth and much of hap- 
piness in them, but they soon pass away or else 
those who dwell in them pass from them. Even 
a holy home would not be sufficient. Our first 
parents had not only a beautiful home but a per- 
fectly happy home, but it was not safe against 
the attacks of Satan, the enemy of God and man. 
He entered that home and by cunning and deceit 
led them to listen to his false promises, turn their 
backs on God and walk away leading down to suf- 
fering, sorrow, pain and death. But the home 
which God hath prepared for His redeemed chil- 
dren is to be safe against every enemy of God and 
man. It is written, " They which enter into this 
city shall go no more out forever." They shall 
reign with Him " forever and ever." There they 
are to enjoy "life eternal." As long as God 
lives they shall live. As long as His throne stands 
they shall be protected by His power and crowned 
and blessed with His love and mercy. 

In answer to the question which springs up in 
every mind as he bids adieu to his friends and kin- 
dred when they die, or as he anticipates his own 
departure, when do believers go to heaven? the 



HEAVEN 329 

Bible is clear and explicit. The Savior said to 
the penitent thief, " This day shalt thou be with 
me in paradise." Paradise means a pleasure gar- 
den. It is used to describe the place of happiness 
in the garden of Eden and it is used to set forth 
the final abode of happiness into which man is to 
be introduced at death. It is one of the terms 
used to describe heaven. Paul says in the twelfth 
chapter of Second Corinthians, fourth verse, that 
he was caught up into paradise. In the same 
context, second verse, he says that he was caught 
up into " the third heaven." Among the Jews 
this was regarded as the highest heaven. They 
called the region of the clouds the first heaven. 
They called the sky, where the sun and moon 
and stars are, the second heaven and then they 
called the place where God has His throne 
the third or highest heaven. When, therefore, 
Paul, evidently referring to the same time and 
experience, says he was caught up into paradise 
or the third heaven, he thereby identifies the two 
names as standing for one and the same place. 
So the apostle John identifies the names of the 
future abode of the redeemed. In the second 
chapter of the book of Revelation he writes: 
" To him that overcometh I will give to eat of the 
tree of life which is in the midst of the paradise of 
God." Then in the last chapter of the same book 
he speaks of the river of life proceeding from be- 
neath the throne of God in heaven and of the tree 
of life growing on the side of the river of life 



330 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

there. Evidently to eat of the tree of life which 
is in the midst of the paradise of God is to eat of 
that tree of life which is upon the bank of the river 
of life which flows from beneath the throne of God 
in heaven. 

To be assured by the Savior that upon the very 
day of his death the believer should be with Him 
in paradise was to be assured that he should be 
with Him in heaven. So likewise Paul teaches 
when he says, " To be absent from the body is to 
be present with the Lord." To change the home 
of the soul from the mortal body to take up an 
abode with Christ is to go to the very heaven 
which hath received Him till the restitution of all 
things. (Acts £:21.) Hence it is written, "I 
heard a voice from Heaven saying, Write: Blessed 
are the dead which die in the Lord from hence- 
forth " — from the very moment of their death 
they are pronounced " blessed," happy, and hence 
the assurance of the apostle, " We know that if 
our earthly house of this tabernacle be dissolved 
we have a building of God, an house not made 
with hands, eternal in the heavens." (II. Corin- 
thians 5:1.) The very moment, therefore, the 
believer leaves the body his soul goes to God who 
gave it — goes to the abode of bliss in the highest 
— the holy, the happy, the eternal home in heaven. 

What a comfort should this truth be to us con- 
cerning our friends and kindred who have fallen 
asleep in Jesus. We should not think of them as 
wandering alone in the shades of the eternal world, 



HEAVEN 331 

nor as suffering penal punishment in purgatorial 
fire, nor as detained in some intermediate state 
short of heaven, but as being conducted at once 
into the mansions of rest in our Father's house in 
heaven. 

What a comfort in view of our own departure 
in the hour when our souls shall be called to 
leave the home in the body to go to the home 
where dwelleth our Lord and all of His redeemed 
people. How earnestly should all seek a title to 
this heavenly inheritance. How diligently should 
all make preparation for going to the celestial 
home. And how earnestly should all seek to lead 
their friends and kindred to walk in the straight 
and narrow way that leadeth unto life eternal. 



CHAPTER XXX 

HELL 

The warnings of Christ are not to be inter- 
preted as the threats of a stern and cruel tyrant, 
but as the counsels of a wise and tender Savior. 
The faithful father warns his son against a course 
of vice and intemperance that he may be saved 
from their terrible consequences. The tender 
mother warns her child to keep out of the fire that 
it may avoid the burning. So Christ warns men 
against sin and hell that they may escape the 
evils they involve. The man of the life-saving 
service who gives a timely warning to the vessel 
about to make shipwreck on rock or reef is re- 
garded as a friend and benefactor; so should 
Christ be regarded who hath so faithfully and so 
plainly forewarned us against the danger and 
punishment of sin. It was the same Savior who 
wept over Jerusalem who foretold the terrible 
doom that awaited that city. It was the Savior 
who suffered and died that lost sinners might be 
saved who gave the most solemn and positive warn- 
ings as to the final and awful penalty that is to 
fall upon those who refuse the offers of love and 

mercy. 

332 



HELL 333 

It is a false charity that would conceal from 
men the fatal result of a course of sin and unbe- 
lief. No option is left to the messenger of God 
concerning the delivery of the message. He is 
to hear the message at God's mouth and warn the 
wicked from Him. To disobey is to incur the dis- 
pleasure of God and to prove recreant to the 
highest interests of man. You will understand, 
then, that it is under a sense of duty to God and 
man that there is here presented the scriptural 
teaching concerning the final loss and punishment 
of all of those who continue in a course of sin 
and rejection of God's plan of redemption till the 
day of salvation is past and gone forever. For all 
such the Savior teaches that there is a place of 
terrible punishment. 

The Savior represents Himself as saying to the 
wicked, at the day of judgment, "Depart from 
me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for 
the devil and his angels," and as a result of their 
sin and condemnation they are to " go away into 
everlasting punishment." Just as there is a place 
of happiness and reward into which the redeemed 
are to be welcomed, so there is a place of suffer- 
ing and punishment into which those who refuse 
to be saved are to go because of their course of 
sin and disobedience. That place is called, in 
plain English, Hell. In the original the specific 
word used by the Savior is Gehenna. This word 
signified formerly the valley of Hinnon which was 
just outside the wall to the south of Jerusalem. 



334 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

It was here that the worship of Moloch was estab- 
lished. It was here that the idolatrous people 
burned their infants in sacrifice to the fire god 
Moloch. Later this place became the dumping 
place for the filth and rubbish of the city. Here 
also were burnt the bodies of dead animals and of 
malefactors. To consume the accumulation of 
trash and rubbish and filth it was set on fire and 
kept burning constantly to prevent sickness and 
epidemics in the city. By a figure of speech the 
place came to designate the place of final and per- 
petual punishment with all of its pollution and 
suffering. It is said to be used twelve times in 
the New Testament to designate the place of final 
punishment. Josephus says (Book 18, § 3, An- 
tiquities) that the teachers of his day — A. D. 37- 
100 — held that the wicked were consigned to a 
place of imprisonment to be punished with eternal 
vengeance. Christ addressed the common people 
and knew how they would understand His words, 
when He spoke of Gehenna, of fire, everlasting fire, 
everlasting punishment. 

The pain from burning is said to be the most 
acute and intense known to the human frame, and 
hence by the use of this figure of speech Christ 
intended to convey the idea of the excruciating 
nature of the suffering of the lost. They are 
bidden to depart into " everlasting fire," and are 
said to go away into " everlasting punishment," so 
that these must be one and the same thing. So 
also in the ninth chapter of Mark the Savior gives 



HELL 335 

a sixfold warning against the terrible end of those 
who cling to their sins. " If thy right hand of- 
fend thee cut it off and cast it from thee; it is 
better for thee to enter into life maimed than 
having two hands to go into hell, where the worm 
dieth not and the fire is not quenched." (Mark 
9: 43-48.) There is, then, a place of punishment 
for the wicked in the other world. It is said that, 
when Judas had committed suicide, " he went to 
his own place," (Acts 1:25) and it is written, 
" The wicked shall be turned into hell and all of 
the nations that forget God." (Psalm 9:17.) 
There the fallen angels are said to be " reserved 
in chains of darkness unto the judgment of the 
great day." There are to be gathered all who 
persistently and finally reject the offer of salva- 
tion, continue in sin and thus ally themselves 
with Satan against the Lord God of heaven and 
earth. There is a prison house of suffering for 
the lost just as surely as there is a home of happi- 
ness for the saved. 

In that abode of darkness and sin there is, on 
the part of the lost, the most intense conscious ac- 
tivity and suffering. All who go there must carry 
with them just those attributes, traits and char- 
acteristics which marked them here. They have 
rejected the only agency by which their hearts 
could be changed and hence, as they had lived in 
sin, even so must they die in their sins and pass 
into eternity with their sinful characters. Mind 
and memory, heart and will and conscience will 



336 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

all be fearfully alive to the past and the present. 
In the light of eternity the mind will probably be 
able to see more clearly, the memory recall more 
readily and the conscience accuse more severely 
than ever before. Things long forgotten will be 
brought to mind. Things which had been lightly 
regarded will now be seen to have a very impor- 
tant part in deciding destiny, and sins that had 
been disregarded will now cry aloud for their just 
punishment. The passage from one home to an- 
other does not change the character of the soul. 
The sphere of the soul's activity is changed but 
not the soul. The rich man was bade to remember 
that in this life he had had his good things and 
Lazarus evil things, but that now Lazarus was 
comforted while he was tormented, showing that 
the power of memory still remained. Then it is 
written concerning the moral condition of those 
who come to the end of this world's probation, 
"He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and 
he which is filthy let him be filthy still; and he 
that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and 
he that is holy let him be holy still." (Revela- 
tions 22 : 11.) The moral character becomes fixed 
at death, but still it is fearfully active. " They 
have no rest day nor night who worship the beast." 
Hell is to be the most sinful place in all of the 
universe. We call this a sinful world, and so it 
is but there is good here as well as evil. The 
good and the bad are mixed. The wheat and the 
tares grow together here. This is the great bat- 



HELL 337 

tie ground between the good and the evil. God 
has a people who, while they are in the world, are 
not of the world. These He is calling and train- 
ing for glory. This world, then, has much of 
good in it. It is far from being as bad as it could 
be. But hell is the seat of the power of sin and 
Satan. There he and his demons have been grow- 
ing in wickedness for thousands of years. There 
have been gathering the wicked of all ages and all 
lands. There they wax worse and worse, for there 
all of the restraints of church and society, of 
grace and religion are removed. There all influ- 
ences for evil are in full sway. If the way to the 
home of the lost be broad and easy the way down- 
ward in that dark abode must be one that can be 
traveled at a fearful rate of speed. There all 
ranks and grades and degrees of wickedness com- 
bine to sink each other to lower and yet lower 
depths of sin and iniquity. There is reached the 
outer darkness of degradation as well as of woe. 
While heaven is a place of perfect harmony, 
hell is a place of terrible discord. Its inhabitants 
will be at enmity with God, for it is because of 
such enmity that they are there, and they hate 
and curse Him for the punishment and disgrace 
that hath fallen upon them. They will be at 
enmity with Satan, for they will discover then, if 
not before, that it was by his cunning and malice 
that they were led in the way that ended in death 
and despair. They will be at enmity to each 
other, — hateful, and hating each other. With 



338 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

such feelings of hate against God and Satan and 
each other, and with every temptation to feel and 
express that hatred, they will be plunged into con- 
fusion worse confounded. 

While heaven is a place of exquisite beauty and 
glory, hell is a place of gloom and darkness and 
deformity. In it is the " outer darkness." In it 
the prisoners are reserved in " chains of dark- 
ness," and unto them is reserved " the mist of 
darkness." Its inhabitants are the "children of 
darkness," and its king is " the prince of dark- 
ness." Moral and physical deformity go hand in 
hand, in many instances, here and there they shall 
be wedded in eternal wedlock. 

While heaven is a place replete with the highest 
and purest forms of happiness, hell is a place of 
awful suffering and misery. There will be there 
an absence of all good. Even the good things of 
this life must all be left behind. All moral and 
spiritual good will be gone. All of the blessings 
of salvation will be lost. No proclamation of par- 
don will be heard there, but the awful words will 
ring out, " He that is unjust, let him be unjust 
still: and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still." 
There no provision of cleansing — there no glad- 
ness and joy — there no grace nor glory — there 
no honor nor happiness nor life eternal. 

There will be the presence of sin and its evil 
fruits, — sin itself with all of its defiling influ- 
ence, the guilt and obligation to be punished, the 
terrible conviction and remorse for sin, together 



HELL 3S9 

with the ever present and fearful apprehension of 
punishment for sin. 

The society of the lost demons and men must 
add to the horror of the sufferings of those who 
are there. To be in wicked Sodom vexed the soul 
of Lot. To be in the abode of those worse than 
ever lived in Sodom must add to the torture of 
some who may go down from respectable homes, 
but homes where God was not honored nor His 
Son worshipped. To be in the presence of those 
led hither by their example and influence must in- 
crease the anguish of the guilty, even as the body 
of the victim brings terror to the murderer. 

Then the infliction of whatever punishment may 
be due to sin as described under the expressions 
"the second death," "eternal fire," and "ever- 
lasting punishment." These expressions suggest 
that which casts the deepest pall of darkness and 
gloom over the awful doom of those who reject 
Christ and persist in their course of sin until the 
end comes to this day of mercy and salvation. 
Their punishment shall be eternal. Men raise no 
objection to eternal life and eternal happiness, but. 
against eternal condemnation and everlasting pun- 
ishment there has ever been the most persistent op- 
position. It would be pleasant to hope that all 
would at last repent and believe and be saved, but 
we find no such hope sustained by reason or taught 
in the Word of God. We see how, in this life, the 
longer men delay taking upon themselves the obli- 
gations of Christianity the less apt they are to do 



340 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

so. We see how character becomes fixed and crys- 
tallized into the good or the bad, and that when so 
fixed in the wrong direction nothing but the al- 
mighty power of God can reverse and change it. 
We see how men become hardened and embittered 
against God when He permits the penalties of their 
own sins to fall upon them. We see, when men 
form bad habits and bad associations, how small 
the probability is that they will break off from 
these and go in the opposite direction. But here 
under the dispensation of grace and spiritual in- 
fluences even this great change may and does some- 
times occur. 

But suppose a man rejects the gospel during 
the whole dispensation of the preached gospel in 
this world ; suppose he allows his habits to become 
fixed in sin, that he associates by preference with 
the enemies of God, that he continues in sin dur- 
ing all of his life, that he rejects God's last offer 
of grace in this life, dies in his sins and goes into 
eternity unchanged; what hope is there that he 
will ever repent and believe? If he did not yield 
under such favorable influences when his con- 
science was yet unseared by sin, what hope can 
reason suggest that he will repent in another 
world? If with all of the sweet and potent influ- 
ences of home and church and the gospel and the 
Spirit of God, he did not choose the good part, 
why should it be thought that he will do so with- 
out these good influences in the land of the Devil 



HELL 341 

and demons and the wicked of all classes and all 
lands ? 

But we are not left to the conclusions of human 
reason on a point so important. The whole drift 
of the Word of God is against the supposition 
that a man will accept in eternity the gospel 
which he rejected in time. There are several 
classes of passages which forbid the idea of repent- 
ance and salvation beyond the grave. For ex- 
ample, we find catalogues or lists of such as shall 
not inherit the kingdom of heaven. Paul gives 
us one list in the sixth chapter of first Corinthians, 
" Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not in- 
herit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived; 
neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers, 
nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with 
mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunk- 
ards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit 
the kingdom of God." He gives a similar list in 
the fifth chapter of Galatians, nineteenth verse, 
concluding with the warning, " They which do 
such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God." 
John, the disciple of love, says, " The fearful and 
unbelieving, and abominable and murderers, and 
whoremongers and sorcerers shall have their part 
in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, 
which is the second death." If it be said that 
this refers only to those guilty of the most flagrant 
sins, then we must not overlook those passages 
which pronounce the penalty upon all who know 



342 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

not God and obey not His gospel. " The Lord 
Jesus Christ shall be revealed from heaven with 
His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking venge- 
ance on them that know not God, and obey not the 
gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." (II Thessa- 
lonians 1:7-9.) All who refuse to accept Christ 
as their Savior shall be denied an entrance into 
heaven. " He that belie veth not the Son shall not 
see life but the wrath of God abideth on Him." 
All who seek too late or in the wrong way shall 
fail to enter into the abode of the righteous for 
Christ hath said, " Many shall seek to enter in and 
shall not be able." 

It is true that if, in this life, men repent and 
turn to God in humble faith they shall be pardoned 
and saved, but no such hope is held out to them 
for the world to come. On the contrary, the es- 
tate of sin and suffering into which they enter at 
death is represented in God's Word as having no 
end. Of the wicked there it is said, " The smoke 
of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever, 
and they have no rest day nor night." (Revela- 
tions 14:11.) "And if thy hand offend thee" 
— that is, a sin as near and dear as a right hand 
— " cut it off ; it is better for thee to enter into 
life maimed, than having two hands to be cast into 
hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched " — 
where " he will burn up the chaff with unquench- 
able fire." (Mark 9:43 and Matthew 3:12.) 

The Savior not only declares negatively that 
this suffering and punishment shall not end, but 



HELL 343 

positively that it shall be eternal. " Depart from 
me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for 
the devil and his angels," and " these shall go 
away into everlasting punishment." (Matthew 
25 : 41, 46.) So Jude and so Peter and Paul and 
Daniel teach. The wicked are compared to wan- 
dering stars " to whom is reserved the blackness 
of darkness forever," (Jude v, 13) or as Peter 
expresses it, " To whom the mist of darkness is 
reserved forever" (II Peter 2:17), and Daniel 
writes, " Many of them that sleep in the dust of 
the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life and 
some to shame and everlasting death." (Daniel 
12:2.) 

The word in these passages, translated ever- 
lasting or eternal, is composed of two Greek words 
meaning always (aei, and on) " always " and 
" being " — being always. It is true that this 
word is sometimes used to describe the lifetime of 
something which is not absolutely eternal, as, for 
example, " the eternal hills," but it is also em- 
ployed to qualify the endless existence of God, 
the eternal duration of the reign of Christ and 
the continued happiness of the redeemed. It 
seems to be used to denote a period of existence 
that shall continue as long as the nature of the 
object described continues to exist. The hills 
shall continue to stand so long as the earth of 
which they are a part shall continue. God is 
eternal in the sense that He is without beginning 
of days or end of years. The redeemed shall 



344 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

enjoy the bliss of heaven so long as their souls live 
and the wicked shall endure the sufferings of the 
lost so long as their souls exist. Precisely the 
same adjective is used to measure the length of 
the misery of the lost that is employed to tell the 
length of the happiness of the redeemed. The 
condemnation of the wicked is said to be " eter- 
nal," their fire is everlasting, their punishment is 
eternal, the smoke of their torment ascendeth up 
" forever," and of them it is said, " Who shall be 
punished with everlasting destruction from the 
presence of the Lord and from the glory of His 
power." (II Thessalonians 1:9.) 

How could God more clearly and more plainly 
have warned men that the fruit and result of their 
sins persistently clung to would be eternal ban- 
ishment from His holy presence, and eternal 
confinement and suffering in the prison house of 
the lost? The only escape from this conclusion 
would be either annihilation or restoration through 
some future probation and repentance. But 
man's nature agrees with the Word of God that 
the soul is immortal and in the entire Word of 
God there is not a promise held out of repentance 
and salvation of those who harden their hearts 
and reject the offers of God's mercy all of the 
period of this life. On the contrary, all of God's 
promises and offers of salvation are for this 
present time. " Behold, now is the accepted time ; 
behold, now is the day of salvation." " How shall 
we escape if we neglect so great salvation? " 



HELL 345 

This is an emphatic way of asserting that there 
will be found no way of escape. All hope of a 
future chance seems to be shut out by the words 
of Hebrews 10:26, 27: "For if we sin wilfully 
after that we have received the knowledge of the 
truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, 
but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and 
fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversa- 
ries." When a man passes into eternity his doom 
is fixed and irrevocable. Between heaven and 
Hell a great gulf is fixed so that they which would 
pass from the one to the other cannot. (Luke 
16:26.) Then he that is unjust will be unjust 
still, and he which is filthy will be filthy still; he 
that is righteous will be righteous still, and he 
that is holy will be holy still. Probation will then 
have ended, character have been fixed and destiny 
determined for all eternity. 

Three leading objections have been urged 
against hell. One is that too much has been made 
of physical punishment and literal fire. The an- 
swer to this is, that the leading churches and best 
interpreters of the Bible agree in holding that the 
chief punishment will consist in the remorse of 
conscience for sins committed and opportunities 
lost, and in whatever direct punishment God shall 
permit to fall upon men who have destroyed them- 
selves by their sins. The body will suffer as the 
companion of the soul, just as it has shared the 
sorrows and joys of the soul in this life. Since 
the eternal fire is said to have been prepared for 



346 THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 

the Devil and his angels which have no bodies, it 
is held to be most probable that fire is here used 
only as a figure of the most acute and intense 
pain and suffering. 

It is objected that according to the popular 
view of hell the great majority of people will be 
lost. This grows out of ignorance or misrepre- 
sentation, for the best authorities hold that when 
you count the children dying in infancy, the re- 
deemed of the past and present and of the future, 
and when a nation shall be born in a day, the num- 
ber ultimately saved will be far greater than the 
number lost, that they will constitute " a great 
multitude, which no man could number, of all 
nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues." 
(Revelations 7:9.) 

It has been objected that to punish men eter- 
nally would not be fair and equal. But besides 
the fact that the condemned are not the best 
judges of their own causes, none of us can measure 
the demerit and the far reaching influence upon 
the individual and upon others of a single sin. 
God, the Judge of all the earth, will surely do 
right. Then, too, it must be remembered that 
when a man sins he opens the way for other sins, 
and that thenceforth he will lead a sinful life and, 
unless renewed and saved while here, will continue 
to sin forever and ever and, therefore, deserve to 
suffer forever and ever, for " without holiness no 
man shall see the Lord." 

It is a mistake to suppose that God will punish 



HELL 347 

all men equally. He teaches exactly the opposite. 
" The servant who knew his Lord's will and did it 
not shall be beaten with many stripes." It shall 
be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the 
day of judgment than for Capernaum whose in- 
habitants heard and yet rejected the Son of God. 
God has expressly said that He " will render unto 
every man according to his deeds." He will shut 
out from heaven all who continue in sin and finally 
reject the only Savior from sin, but of those thus 
shut out there will be all kinds and degrees of 
sinners who have enjoyed all kinds and degrees of 
light and knowledge and opportunities. It will 
be the office of Christ, the Judge of the quick and 
the dead, to mete out with even-handed justice the 
punishment due to each and to all. And such will 
be the fairness with which this is done that every 
mouth will be stopped and speechless in view of 
the fact that not one of all of the lost can charge 
God with injustice. The curse which will rest 
upon them will be the curse of sin which they 
brought upon themselves and from which they re- 
fused to be delivered by the compassionate Savior 
who came to seek and to save that which was lost. 



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